'Grown Ups' would have been funnier if Chris Farley was alive

I finally got a chance the other day to watch the comedy film, “Grown Ups,” which was released in theatres on June 25, and I have to admit that I was not overly impressed with this movie. It was mildly entertaining, at best, and left me wondering at several points about just how much more time was left before the thing would be over.

Maybe I expected too much from the movie, given the all-star cast of comedians in the film – Adam Sandler, Chris Rock, David Spade, Rob Schneider, Salma Hayek Pinault, Colin Quinn, Steve Buscemi, Tim Meadows, Dan Patrick, Kevin James and Norm MacDonald. Directed by Dennis Dugan, the movie was written by Sandler and Fred Wolf.

For those of you who haven’t seen “Grown Ups,” it’s about a group of kids in the late 70s who win a middle school basketball championship on a controversial last second shot, giving their coach the only championship he would ever win in his career. The kids advance through school, graduate and go their separate ways.

Fast forward to the present day, and they’re all greeted with the sad news that their coach has died. From points across the country, they make their way back to their small hometown, where they attend their coach’s funeral. They use the occasion to pay homage to their coach and hold a weeklong, impromptu reunion with their families at a lakeside cabin.

Eventually, they encounter the now-grown members of the team they beat in the middle school championship game, and the movie ends when the two teams play a rematch.

Despite what I thought about the movie, it did very well financially in theatres. Against a shooting budget of $80 million, this film raked in gross revenues of over $271 million.

One interesting bit of trivia about this movie is that it was originally set to be released in the late 90s with actor Chris Farley to play the role that was eventually given to comedian Kevin James. Farley died from a cardiac arrest caused by a drug overdose in December 1997, which halted the production of “Grown Ups” and resulted in the project being shelved for over a decade.

In the end, I found this movie to be a big let down, given what you would expect from the comedians who were in this movie. I expected a rip-roaring comedy that would leave me gasping for breath, and I ended up bored to tears. Don’t get me wrong, there are a few funny moments in the movie, but mostly it was a big disappointment.

How many of you have seen this movie? What did you think about it? Did you like it? Dislike it? Let us know in the comments section below.