Family films are probably the hardest movies on the planet to pull off. Spy Kids managed alright, most of Disney’s stuff does well, and Pixar is pretty much infallible. Where does Are We There Yet? register you ask? Well, it doesn’t. Are We There Yet? is so bad it’s in a league all its own. My lips forgot the meaning of a smile in this film. It took an hour for them to even figure out how to crack a grin after seeing Are We There Yet? The film is so desperately unfunny, that its entire moral is swallowed up and spit out by its horrible and sometimes offensive gags.

The film focuses on one man’s horrific journey with two of the worst children on planet. If there’s such a thing as demon spawn, Lindsey and Kevin Kingston (Aleisha Allen, Philip Bolden) would be it. If kids who watch this film will walk away with anything, it won’t be its semi-useful moral, it’ll be that it’s ok to run away, steal cars, break valuable equipment, and terrorize their mom’s friends. Just the kind of thing I’d want my kid to get from a movie. Hell, parents might as well bring their kid to Assault on Precinct 13. They’d probably learn the same stuff.

As for the plot, well the plot isn’t much better. Nick Persons (Ice Cube), owner of a specialty goods sports store and overall “player”, has a thing against kids. He refuses to date any women, however attractive they may be, if they have a kid (because he apparently has no preference for personality). That is, until he sees Suzanne Kingston, a “breeder”, as he call it. But, despite her demon-spawn children, Nick falls in love. But, as these things work, Suzanne doesn’t’ feel the same about Nick. So, this puts Nick in the “friend zone” as he likes to call it. Apparently, the friend zone is where a guy’s stuck having to actually listen to a woman instead of having sex with her. Again, kids love this. Nick persists though, determined to surpass the friend zone. However, he soon finds himself with the job of getting Suzanne’s kids across the state to her job’s New Year convention by airplane. Of course, the kids weasel their way off the plane, and later, manage to miss their train. So now Nick is stuck with having to drive the kids across the state to the convention. From here, Are We There Yet? is a simply a never ending string of horribly unfunny gags pitting evil children against the ill-willed Nick Persons. It’s commonplace for family films to be a icky affair for parents, but if kids end up liking this film, it’ll be for all the wrong reasons.

United States, 2005

U.S. Release Date: 1/19/05

Running Length: 1:31

MPAA Classification: PG (language and rude humor)

Director: Brian Levant

Cast: Ice Cube, Nia Long, Aleisha Allen, Philip Bolden, Jay Mohr

Screenplay: Steven Gary Banks, Claudia Grazioso, J. David Stem, David N. Weiss

Producers: Matt Alvarez, Ice Cube, Dan Kolsrud

Cinematography: Thomas E. Ackerman

Editing: Lawrence Jordan

Music: David Newman

U.S. Distributor: Revolution Studios