Potency
6.75 out of 10 | Rental
Rated: PG-13 Thematic elements, sexual content, some drug material, brief violence and language
Release Date: November 22, 2013
Runtime: 1 hour 45 minutes
Release Date: November 22, 2013
Runtime: 1 hour 45 minutes
Director: Ken Scott
Writers: Ken Scott, Martin Petit
Cast: Vince Vaughn, Chris Pratt, Cobie Smulders, Bobby Moynihan, Adam Chanler-Berat, Britt Robertson, Jack Reynor
Writers: Ken Scott, Martin Petit
Cast: Vince Vaughn, Chris Pratt, Cobie Smulders, Bobby Moynihan, Adam Chanler-Berat, Britt Robertson, Jack Reynor
SYNOPSIS: An affable underachiever finds out he's fathered 533 children through anonymous donations to a fertility clinic 20 years ago. Now he must decide whether or not to come forward when 142 of them file a lawsuit to reveal his identity.
REVIEW: Writer and director Ken Scott takes his own 2011 film Starbuck and remakes it with American sweetheart Vince Vaughn. Scott did have help from co-writer Martin Petit the first go-around but seems to have found his own way this try.
David Wozniak (Vince Vaughn, The Internship) lives a carefree and responsibility free life as a meat delivery driver for his father's business. He owes money to the wrong people, can't seem to keep from getting parking tickets, and has all but abandoned his girlfriend Emma (Cobie Smoulders, The Avengers). When he learns that his sperm donating years ago has resulted in him fathering over 500 kids - and that over 100 of those offspring are petitioning to discover David's identity. He must make the impossible choice whether to reveal himself to the enquiring kids or stay anonymous no matter what. While deciding David has to juggle work, his newly pregnant girlfriend, and serving as a guardian angel for the kids he wants to be close to.
Vince Vaughn takes a more dramatic turn in Delivery Man. His wingman Owen Wilson is absent from the story, replaced by mediocre lawyer and best friend of twenty years Brett (Chris Pratt, Zero Dark Thirty). The normal silly hi-jinks are replaced by something more akin to a possible dramatic edge. Dealing with over one hundred kids who want to find out their sperm father's identity can be a logistical nightmare.
Unable to include all of the kids, Vaughn and his character Dave focus on just a few of them. From a barista who want to be an actor, to a girl at the end of her rope, to a handicapped young man living in a group home, the story tries to give a little slice of all the lives that David had created. Unfortunately some of the dramatic elements that come with telling these individual tales leads to one child left out by the end. Understanding that it is difficult to tell so many stories in a hundred minute film, some threads start and do not really end to satisfaction.
Delivery Man is a Vince Vaughn movie with dramatic potential, but the story really doesn't offer enough of either the drama or the company to know what it wants to be when it grows up. There are loose ends used strictly as a device to get to the next point of the story, Cobie Smulders is underused and forgotten through much of the film, and the brothers in the Wozniak family, including Tommy Moynahan, don't get enough screen time to really make a difference. Chris Pratt does the flick proud as his typical Parks and Recreation self, his character mugging and scratching his head throughout.
Delivery Man, based on the story Starbuck, could have been an utterly chaotic slapstick comedy or a straight heart tugging drama. Vince Vaughn does all he can to straddle and blur the line between them. At the end of the day Delivery Man is what you would expect from a father of over five hundred children - exhausted and confused.
Vince Vaughn takes a more dramatic turn in Delivery Man. His wingman Owen Wilson is absent from the story, replaced by mediocre lawyer and best friend of twenty years Brett (Chris Pratt, Zero Dark Thirty). The normal silly hi-jinks are replaced by something more akin to a possible dramatic edge. Dealing with over one hundred kids who want to find out their sperm father's identity can be a logistical nightmare.
Unable to include all of the kids, Vaughn and his character Dave focus on just a few of them. From a barista who want to be an actor, to a girl at the end of her rope, to a handicapped young man living in a group home, the story tries to give a little slice of all the lives that David had created. Unfortunately some of the dramatic elements that come with telling these individual tales leads to one child left out by the end. Understanding that it is difficult to tell so many stories in a hundred minute film, some threads start and do not really end to satisfaction.
Delivery Man is a Vince Vaughn movie with dramatic potential, but the story really doesn't offer enough of either the drama or the company to know what it wants to be when it grows up. There are loose ends used strictly as a device to get to the next point of the story, Cobie Smulders is underused and forgotten through much of the film, and the brothers in the Wozniak family, including Tommy Moynahan, don't get enough screen time to really make a difference. Chris Pratt does the flick proud as his typical Parks and Recreation self, his character mugging and scratching his head throughout.
Delivery Man, based on the story Starbuck, could have been an utterly chaotic slapstick comedy or a straight heart tugging drama. Vince Vaughn does all he can to straddle and blur the line between them. At the end of the day Delivery Man is what you would expect from a father of over five hundred children - exhausted and confused.
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