We’re The Millers

**½

Well, I’m awake and I speak English, so yeah I know what you’re saying.

If it were twice as smart, or half as earnest, I think this could have been an enjoyable movie. As it was, there were definitely several very funny scenes and a few horrific (comedic) ones as well. IMDb compared it to The Heat, but that movie had a better balance between absurdity and reality. The Heat realized that its flawed characters were ripe for mocking, whereas here Rawson Marshall Thurber—director of Dodgeball—was a little too confident in the inherent comedy of his characters. The preposterous premise here is that a depressingly old drug dealer—Jason Sudeikis, Horrible Bosses—gets mugged and robbed because…wait for some coincidences…a homeless girl—Emma Roberts—is getting mugged extremely slowly by three “Gutter Punks,” a young man—Will Poulter, Lee Carter in Son of Rambow—wants to cross the street to save her and Sudeikis condescends to help and when Poulter tells said Punks of Sudeikis’ profession they rob him and burglarize his apartment of all of his drugs and all of his (and some of his drug dealing boss’) money. So then Sudeikis’ college buddy/drug dealer boss wants him to smuggle some drugs into the country in an RV, so Sudeikis, obviously, convinces the Roberts and Poulter, plus a down on her luck stripper—Jennifer Aniston, to pose as his family. Yeah, not exactly a well thought out movie.

Molly C. Quinn, Will Poulter, Kathryn Hahn, Emma Roberts, Jennifer Aniston, Jason Sudeikis, and Nick Offerman, We’re The Millers, © 2013 WB.

Since the boss man—Ed Helms, The Hangover— is rooting for Sudeikis’ success, so later in the movie we meet Mexican Tomer Sisley (not an actual Mexican) and he has a great Mexican right hand man, Matthew Willig—Yuri the Gobbler, “Chuck”, also not an actual Mexican. There appeared to be only one actual Mexican, the always wonderful Luis Guzman. But as wonderful as he always is, he was born in Puerto Rico. Close enough? Apparently Denver is much closer to Mexico than Puerto Rico is. Would having an actual Mexican fix a film that expects us after 60 minutes to really want this fake family to stay together? This was a bad idea for a movie and a waste of many talented people’s time. There were serious topics here! Topics that this movie bit into like the gumming of a toothless old mutt. Homelessness? Do not worry, Roberts sleeps on her friends’ couches! Mexicans trying to sneak into America? Great! Now our drug smugglers can sneak in their drugs! Pressuring women to have sex with the men they strip for? Boner Garage—Laura Leigh, officially listed as Kymberly—was psyched for that!

Laura Leigh with her Boner Garage tattoo, We’re The Millers.

That said, there were definitely funny parts and nice performances. Tom Lennon—Lt. Dangle on “Reno 911″—has a nice half-scene when he runs into Sudeikis and tries to tell him that he has the life by not having anyone to keep track of him, i.e. no wife, no kids. And Lennon is fat! I have never seen him fat before. At some point Nick Offerman and Kathryn Hahn made me laugh as a couple, I just cannot remember when. The above quote from Sudeikis was in response to this carney, Scottie P, who ends every sentence with “you know what I’m saying?” There is also Ken Marino making a joke about needing to add sex to the menu at the strip club he runs, because of the competition from across the street from an Apple store. Jennifer Aniston nailed her delivery of the punchline in that joke. And there truly are several more very funny moments. But there are probably several funny moments in an animated train wreck too, but that does not make it a good train ride.