Grown Ups is the latest from Team Sandler and he brings along his best friends and the Happy Madison All Stars for a comedy that succeeds on the charisma of its actors and nothing much else.

The film revolves around a group of five childhood friends who are reunited after years apart when their childhood basketball coach passes away and they all attend the funeral.  After the ceremony the guys decide to spend the rest of the Fourth of July weekend at a summer cabin that they spent their summers at as kids and hope to have a reconnection while showing their own children how to live like they did.  Meanwhile, an old town rivalry begins brewing as they cross paths with some of the local kids that never left.

The film is light on inspiration but the chemistry and real friendship between these guys is what keeps the film alive.  Full of fun cameos and decent physical humor the laughs in the picture usually tread for the pretty low brow stuff, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t get me laughing.  It just would have been nice to have some sharper and more inventive writing, especially with a solid batch of stand up writers staring here.

Grown Ups is also an easy to swallow design and follows formula to a tee and even gets way to over sentimental and you can tell that they didn’t want this film to challenge any of its viewers.  So enters the question, can you really penalize a film all that much for achieving for what it set out to do.  I am not one to get on a high horse and demand near art out of a movie to be called good and this film does exactly what it is trying to do and does it to pretty decent effect.  So I guess what I am trying to say is that if you are interested in the picture you shouldn’t be afraid of checking it out as it is probably exactly what you expect it to be.

I have mentioned that actors in the film are what make it enjoyable and there are a bevy of stars involved.  Sandler and his family in the film are the main focus of the five friends and while Sandler is funny he isn’t doing anything we haven’t seen before from him.  Chris Rock is criminally underused in his role, as is Maya Rudolph as his wife as she continues to show how funny she can be.  David Spade, Kevin James, and Rob Schneider play to their perceived performances that the audiences expect as well and it is a shame Rock was the only one given anything somewhat interesting to do.  Then again, the film is playing it safe and wants to meet your expectations so this shouldn’t be all that surprising.  Salma Hayek and Maria Bello do a fine enough job as the wives of Sandler and James, with Bello turning the films only other inspired performance.

In the end, Grown Ups will supply the laughs but nothing much else beyond that.  If you like your comedy to be low brow, predictable, and a bit over the top then look right here.  The film tries to play exactly to what the main stream audience wants and does it fairly well.  I just wish a few of these talented guys, Sandler and Rock specifically, would try and do something a little edgier and more interesting than this cookie cutter summer comedy.  Either way, it is an enjoyable enough diversion that is worth your hour and a half of attention if you are in the mood.

Grown Ups is a C+