I wasn't prepared to laugh as much as I did in the hilariously inappropriate WHY HIM? Chalk it up to a fantastic cast and some modern twists on predictable jokes.
The great Bryan Cranston (Breaking Bad) is a small town owner of a printing company, blissfully unaware that the business he's built for many years is about to become irrelevant.
He's surrounded by a loving and large group of loyal employees, led by Lou (Cedric the Entertainer in hilarious form).
When Ned and his wife Barb (Megan Mullally, funnier than I've seen her in years) decide to visit their daughter Stephanie at Stanford for the Christmas holidays, they can't anticipate the adventures that await them in meeting her boyfriend, Laird Mayhew.
Laird (James Franco at hilarious full tilt) is a young, billionaire software developer who lives in an amazing home, with fantastic toys, live in celebrity chefs and the best personal assistant since Kato (Clouseau, not OJ) in Gustav, played to perfection by Keegan-Michael Key.
Laird goes to every length to ingratiate himself to Barb and Ned, along with Stephanie's little brother Scotty (Griffin Gluck).
While Ned grows more suspicious and protective of his "little girl", Barb and Scotty are charmed by Laird in all his boy-man, profane eccentricity.
Credit the writers with finding clever and very funny ways to spin the story in hilarious ways down you only think is a predictable plot.
By the time Barb was out-of-her-mind baked on edibles and Elon Musk was dropping one liners at a Christmas party in honor of the mid-west couple, I was laughing too hard to do anything but enjoy the madness.
Jonah Hill has a hand in the writing and he and Ben Stiller produced the film and it looks terrific, getting every penny out of its budget.
Franco is an underrated talent. I couldn't think of too many young actors that could tread this narrow ground between profanely obnoxious and charming and get away with it so well. Cranston is a fantastic actor and his facial expressions in reaction to the chaos around him are fall-over-funny.
His mid-west morals get quite a challenge in the face of Laird's lifestyle that screams excess and honesty in equal doses.
I had not seen Zoey Deutch (Stephanie) before, but she's really terrific as the foil between her Dad and Laird. By the end of the film, you'll start to question which one is the biggest problem in some pretty hilarious ways.
WHY HIM? Why not! Much better than I thought it would be, it's loaded with adult laughs and gets a B.
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