Nixon vs 100 Bad Movies: March 2011

Personally I think that making a sequel to any movie, is a bit of a gamble. Countless sequel movies have failed to achieve the success of the original, for a lot of different reasons. It comes as no surprise that this list I'm slowly working through is full of various sequel movies. Quite often characters change from original to sequel, to accommodate actors/actresses bailing on their characters and not wanting to do sequels, which I reckon is fair enough. One thing that does annoy me however is when the original actor bails so they get someone else in to play his character, which is what has happened here.

Daddy Day Camp is the sequel to 2003's Daddy Day Care, starring Eddie Murphy, in which 2 men upon losing their jobs become stay at home dads. The need for cash drives these two to starting their own day car business. I've seen it a couple of times but not for a few years now, I do however recall having a good chuckle throughout the movie. Eddie Murphy's character Charlie Hinton was played by Cuba Gooding Jnr in Daddy Day Camp, and lets be honest, he's nowhere near the comic that Eddie Murphy.

Charlie Hinton is not the only character to be played by a different actor/actress, Charlie's wife Kim Hinton, is now played by Tamala Jones (previously played by Regina King), also Charlie's son Ben is played by a different actor although I think that's more to do with kids growing up quick etc.

Daddy Day Camp has pretty much been booed by all and sundry since it's release in 2007.

It WON the Razzie award in in 2008 for WORST Prequel/Sequel.

It also received Razzie nominations for:

Worst Actor - Cuba Gooding Jnr
Worst Director - Fred Savage
Worst Picture
Worst Screenplay

The general consensus is that this movie is a bad movie, and its place at 95 on IMDB's bottom 100 is justified.

WHY DID I LIKE IT THEN???

Yeah that's right, I liked it. Granted it's not as good as Daddy Day Care, but I certainly didn't think it was bad.
This is why.

1) It's a kids movie, Its not trying to be, nor is it ever going to be 'To Sir With Love' (which I recently saw the other day for the first time and thought it was tops). Daddy Day Camp is meant to be a light hearted simple movie, essentially for children, nothing to complex, it's just for fun.

2) Cuba Gooding Jnr is (in my opinion) a good actor. He did win an Oscar in 1997 for Best Supporting Actor in Jerry McGuire, he knows his craft. He stepped into a role not previously his own, which I imagine is difficult and didn't do too badly. Again this is a kids movie, designed for kids, and while I could see his portrayal of Charlie Hinton as being somewhat childish, I thought it was a fairly good illustration of how someone who spends all day every day with little kids might occasionally behave.

3) I laughed, quite a lot, sometimes even out loud. Maybe (and I'm sure you wouldn't have to look to hard to find people who would agree with this) I'm a bit childish, a bit immature, and quite easily amused. But a lot of the humour really appealed to me. eg:

Phil: I've gotta drop the kids off at the pool.
Juliette: We have a pool?
Phil: Uh, no

Call me, Mullet. Business up front,
party in the back, baby.

Besides the humour, at no point in the movie, did I question why I was watching it. At no point did I have to force myself to keep watching. And when the movie was done and dusted I WAS SMILING. Simple basic story about working as a team, self belief, and fathers and sons overcoming their differences and being buddies again. Cheesy, corny, cliched, simplicity, and I'm not ashamed to say that I liked it..

The story follows Charlie and Phil, on their mission to take their own kids to day camp, at the same camp they went to as kids. When they get there they find it a rundown dump on the verge of being sold, to "the enemy" Camp Canola, which is cashed up and run by Charlies childhood nemesis Lane Warner.

Of course Charlie and Phil go into partnership with the current owner Uncle Morty, who bails on them at the first opportunity, and then begins the challenge of making enough money so as to not lose EVERYTHING.

Charlie's father Colonel Buck is eventually enlisted, and strains their already strained relationship. Charlie and Buck have very differing styles when dealing with the kids, which stresses both of them out, leading to the inevitable break up and reconciliation. Everything after halfway is very predictable and the movie end on a happy note after triumph in the inter camp olympiad.

The movie is only an hour and a half long, which is about standard for a film of this type. It does lead me to question what it is that people expect from films like this when they pick them up. It was obvious to me that this was never going to be a life changing cinematic journey of epic proportions from the get go, and to be honest I got pretty much exactly what I was expecting. Well I actually got a little bit more, because my expectations were heavily influenced by the fact the movie is on this list!

The old saying "Don't judge a book by it's cover" is classic and is never going to be wrong, however when it comes to this movie and movies like it, I think it's safe to judge a little bit.

This movie has gone some ways to restoring my hope that watching all the movies on this list might actually be achievable.

Next up is the first of NBA superstars, with Shaquille O'Neal starring as Kazaam in the movie of the same name. Number 94 is 1996's Kazaam

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Like number 94 on the TOP 250 Movies as voted by IMDB users -

2009's Animated Masterpiece - Up

Starring Ed Asner and Jordan Nagai