Parents' Guide to Buddy Games

Only in 2020 would one of the year's funniest movies also be the most regressively offensive. In many ways, Duhamel's raucous vanity project (he writes, directs, produces, and stars as the film's only cool character) is a throwback to the early 2000s: the kind of dumb comedy you'd expect to star Seann William Scott, about a bunch of White guys who treat each other and everyone else disrespectfully. It's all in terrible taste, but a lot of it is very funny, although it doesn't reach the highest of the lowbrow standard, The Hangover. It's more like a more socially insensitive Grown-Ups -- and when Adam Sandler outclasses you, you've got problems.

Diversity is barely existent here. Jokes based in sexuality abound: There's stereotypical behavior from the movie's one gay character, who's in the closet (again, what year was this film made?). It's shocking that outspoken feminist Olivia Munn is the love interest: Her character, Tiffany, exists only as Bob's beautiful girlfriend who waits for him at home while baking pies in lingerie -- seriously. And when she and another wifey, separately, aren't given attention for a moment, they pout and act out, sometimes violently. In the meantime, the men talk about women as something to "do" rather than as human beings. They're louts, and that's kind of the point here. They're not admirable, aspirational, or imitable. Buddy Games is a fantasy film for the guy past his prime who hasn't lived up to his own expectations: Bromance over romance! Stupidity over substance! Gross over growth! And while teens should be steered away from this tacky comedy, for adults, it may be a guilty pleasure.