Day 6 - Paul Blart: Mall Cop

After five days of fantasy, it's time to dip a tentative toe into the murky and often piranha-infested waters of action comedy. It's a genre whose ranks encompass some of the most widely-loved films of all time, from Romancing the Stone to Lethal Weapon, encompassing huge chunks of Bruce Willis' output along the way and arguably stretching past Hot Fuzz to the start of the new Marvel renaissance. These are movies designed to delight without demanding, archetypal popcorn flicks, and at their best, there are few pleasanter ways to spend a few lazy hours.

Paul Blart: Mall Cop takes these trappings and melds them with a traditional underdog story,  whilst keeping to a strict PG rating. Critics were divided, but the viewing public were generally unimpressed.

The good

A slow first act (I was seriously considering finding something else to write about today) segues into something faster-paced and altogether more fun once the siege situation kicks into gear. The action sequences are passably inventive, and the stuntwork is a genuine delight. I wish more directors would realize that the CGI stuff just doesn't look the same.

Performances are uniformly charming, with special mention reserved for Shirley Knight and Raini Rodriguez as, respectively, Blart's mother and teenage daughter. The family scenes have a real warmth, giving the impression of a believable, loving family unit. 

Finally, it's really nice to find a PG-rated family film that doesn't try and push the taste envelope. I'm as big a fan of cinematic sex and violence as anybody. I'm also a fan of ultrahot chilli species, but that doesn't mean I necessarily want to consume them at every meal.

The bad

This one takes absolutely forever to warm up. Around a third of the running time is spent convincing us of what a sweet guy Paul is. Beyond a certain level of basic human decency I didn't care how kind he was, I just wanted to get to the baddie-bashing, Segway-skidding mayhem. 

The film is set in a mall. Heavy product placement, therefore, was something of an inevitability. In all fairness, however, it doesn't stand out so much as in the likes of, say, Little Nicky.

Finally, we come to the part I haven't been looking forward to discussing - the size thing. I make no secret of the fact that I'm a larger person myself; once I step away from the computer, it's pretty difficult to miss. It's not an ideal situation, but it's also not one that I have the time or inclination to try hard to change - most of the time, I'd much rather just try and forget about it. With every single film I see that uses the comedy fat person stereotype, this task becomes just that little bit harder. 

When, therefore, we see Paul, say, denting a ventilation shaft or unable to go five minutes without eating something unhealthy, I can't help but wonder: is this what people think when they look at me? You're welcome to tell me that I shouldn't be defensive about a silly, inconsequential comedy flick, but Amy, his love interest, is pretty skinny, and at no point do we see her emphatically refusing food or holding a helium balloon and being carried off into the wide blue yonder. 

The verdict

I liked this one, really I did, but it wouldn't have taken much for me to have liked it a whole lot more.

Nothing more to see here, folks. You can move along now.