What if Marvel’s hottest director had cut his teeth on one of the most underappreciated comedies in Hollywood history? That’s right, true believer: before he directed Deadpool & Wolverine, Shawn Levy brought us Cheaper by the Dozen (2003), a family comedy with an impossibly deep bench of talented actors. If you’re ready for some serious laughs, all you have to do is stream this cozy hit on Hulu.
The premise of Cheaper by the Dozen is that a rural football coach moves his family back to his hometown so he can start a new coaching gig at his Alma mater. His kids (all twelve of them) don’t love their new home, and things get worse when his wife begins a national tour to promote her new book. This leaves him to balance his new job with being the sole parent of some very rambunctious children, resulting in humorous hijinks that shine a spotlight on the film’s charismatic cast.
A Not-So-Dirty Dozen
The cast is perhaps the best part of Cheaper by the Dozen, including Tom Welling (best known for the Smallville TV series) as the oldest son, a rising football star. Another star is Hilary Duff (best known for A Cinderella Story) as a precocious teenage daughter with plenty of her own drama to deal with. The movie also features Ashton Kutcher (best known for That ‘70s Show) and a slew of great character actors, including Dax Shepard, Wayne Knight, Jared Padalecki, and many more.
For all of the younger cast’s talents, the real star of Cheaper by the Dozen is Hollywood legend Steve Martin as the proud patriarch forced to play Mr. Mom to his double-digit brood of kids. Martin gets plenty of laughs by playing a straight man (much like he did in Planes, Trains, and Automobiles) for much wackier characters to bounce off of. Fortunately, he always finds the heart in the film’s humor, and he serves as an anchoring presence whenever this movie threatens to go off the rails.
Hated By Critics, Loved By Audiences
Cheaper By the Dozen didn’t exactly wow the critics (more on this in a minute), but that didn’t keep it from drumming up a solid theatrical audience. Against a budget of $40 million, this little comedy that could earned $190.5 million. After this box office success, the studio produced a sequel (Cheaper by the Dozen 2) that brought back the original cast but not the original director, though Shawn Levy has a fun cameo.
When Cheaper by the Dozen came out, critics were unimpressed, and that’s putting it mildly. On Rotten Tomatoes, the movie has a bleak rating of 25 percent, with critics noting how this crowded cast of big names helps create a suitably chaotic story. However, they felt that the chaos didn’t really translate to laughs and that the script could have used more jokes to earn its comedy cred.
On to the big question: why in the name of The Three Amigos am I recommending you watch a Steve Martin film that critics dragged for filth? First of all, Cheaper by the Dozen still managed to impress some big-name critics, including Roger Ebert, who gave it three out of four stars and dubbed it “lighthearted fun.” That perfectly sums up this movie’s vibe: it’s something you can watch with your family, or even just stream on your own when you need the perfect cure to those pesky holiday blues.
The Cast Maketh the Movie
Additionally, the cast really makes this movie: I’m someone who grew up devouring every Steve Martin movie I could find (heck, I even loved The Man With Two Brains!), and it was fun to see how the younger actors bounced off this statesman of Hollywood comedy. When I got a bit older, I really loved both That ‘70s Show and Smallville, so it was fun to see Ashton Kutcher and Tom Welling in this movie’s crowded cast of performers. Basically, for movie lovers of a certain age, Cheaper by the Dozen is the cinematic equivalent of Fortnite: a lighthearted sandbox where all of your favorite character actors get to hang out and just sort of vibe.
Finally, while box office will never be the sole indicator of quality, it’s worth noting again that this movie was so profitable that a sequel was almost immediately greenlit. Critics may have hated Cheaper by the Dozen, but it was a monster hit with general audiences over two decades ago and has become a staple holiday film for many of its fans (myself included). When you need something to watch with the fam during Thanksgiving or Christmas (assuming you don’t all get sucked into the final Stranger Things season), this movie is pitch-perfect.
Will you agree that Cheaper by the Dozen is a star-studded comedy extravaganza full of laughs, or is this one stuffed turkey you’d rather put back in the oven? You won’t know until you stream Shawn Levy’s hit film for yourself on Hulu. Afterward, you may never look at comedy or fatherhood the same way again!
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.yahoo.com ’
