Review | The House
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The House
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Movie Critic Dave's Ratings
Stars
1.0
Grade
User Stars
Total Votes: 3
Average Rating: 0.83
0.83
Rate!
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Release:
June 30, 2017
Rated:
R
Run Time:
88 min
Homepage:
NA
Budget:
$40,000,000
Revenue:
$34,200,000
Genres
Review
By Movie Critic Dave

Over the last two decades Will Ferrell's career trajectory has been trending in the wrong direction. Its path falling steeper and steeper with each passing movie decision. But it's the latest co-called "comedy" from first-time director and established screenwriter, Andrew Jay Cohen (Neighbors 1 & 2 and Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates), that marks an absolute low for the one-time king of comedy.


Timid suburban parents Scott and Kate (Ferrell and Amy Poehler) are banking on a local town scholarship to help pay for their daughter's expensive college tuition. But when a crooked councilman (Nick Kroll) votes to terminate the scholarship fund in favor of building a fancy new community pool, they must do whatever it takes to afford the first fall payment, even if it means opening an underground casino in their emotionally unstable friend's (The League's Jason Mantzoukas) house. The couple quickly learns that they have to toughen up in order to run a successful and respectable illegal gambling operation.

 


The story borderlines on lunacy, the laughs are almost non-existent and, in fact, there's almost nothing redeeming in Cohen's The House. I apply to the school where comedies are supposed to be clever and make you laugh. The "clever" tag has faded a bit over the years, but at least most modern comedies can still generate a response with some type of identifiable humor. Oddly, The House doubles down on incoherently improvised gibberish that's neither funny or effective in any way, shape or form. Known for his outlandishly over-the-top personae in tv shows and on the big screen, Jason Mantzoukas stands as the only lifeline in the film and, honestly, he isn't all that great either. Roll the dice with something, even anything, else and take a long walk away from The House.

 

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