Johnson Family Vacation

[StevePulaski]

Johnson Family Vacation (2004)
Directed by: Christopher Erskin

Rating: ★½

The most offensive thing about Johnson Family Vacation is its cloying ability to be safe and harmless at every turn. The film is a conceptual snore and an even bigger redundant mess of cliches, stale humor, and worn references once it begins to play itself out. It tells the story of a goofy but well-meaning family, led by the patriarch Nate Johnson (Cedric the Entertainer), who desperately wants to reconnect his distant family following the divorce with his wife Dorothy (Vanessa Williams). Him and his wife, along with their kids - the careless Nikki (Solange Knowles), the smart-ass D.J. (Bow Wow), and the precocious seven-year-old Destiny (Gabby Soleil) - plan to make the trek from Los Angeles to Missouri, sticking to a tight schedule concocted by Nate that will have them in Missouri in due time.

What if I told you that sticking to the schedule didn't wind up happening? What if I told you that everything that could possibly go wrong for the family went wrong and they were met with a barrage of ridiculous circumstances? Would you be at all surprised or would you just go along with the film's silliness? There was a point in time, about thirty minutes into Johnson Family Vacation, where I sat back and instead of actively anticipating I was passively expecting and observing. I ceased any and all anticipation and just went on to expecting a rote assembly of cliches and preposterous circumstances.

This is what I bill a film under the subgenre of "maximum antics, minimum laughter," or a film that is so heavily bent on situational humor it forgets to actually find the humor in such situations. What often entails, and does here, is a mindless excursion filled with comedic pitfalls and dead-ends begging to get a laugh out of its audience. The film is so menial and redundant that its existence begs a justification; it's so bland and flavorless that it's not even worth existing, let alone analyzing or reviewing.

Again, Johnson Family Vacation isn't especially offensive in any regard; it's existence and its noticeable harmlessness is by far the most annoying thing about it. It does nothing to capitalize on its archetypes masquerading as characters - something that made successful road comedies like National Lampoon's Vacation, the film this wants to be so very much, lasting in impact and memorable. Instead, we get a comedy that operates on autopilot and, in turn, aims low, hits low, and provides us with almost nothing in terms of longevity.

Starring: Cedric the Entertainer, Vanessa Williams, Solange Knowles, Bow Wow, and Gabby Soleil. Directed by: Christopher Eskrin.