627. Paul Blart: Mall Cop (2009)

Starring: Kevin James, Keir O’Donnell, Jayma Mays

Director: Steve Carr

Running Time: 91 mins

Paul Blart: Mall Cop is an American film about the events after a shopping centre is taken over by a group of criminals, and the bravery of a heroic mall cop to save the hostages and help bring the complex back under justice’s control.

Yeah. While this film seems like your average fun action comedy, it really ends up falling flat on its face most of the time. It does manage to be mildly entertaining through its parodying of Die Hard, set in a shopping centre, however the comedy is so repetitive and never at all funny that it quickly grows tiring to watch.

Basically, there are two jokes in this movie. One is the fact that the events of Die Hard are being acted out in a shopping centre, and the other is the use of Kevin James.

I’m not saying that it’s a poor performance by Kevin James, in fact he sticks to the brief extremely well, but it’s the scripting and ideas that really are terrible. The fact is that every single gag in this film, and even the entire premise, relies on you thinking: ‘He he, he’s fat and clumsy’, and that’s it.

Honestly, if you don’t think that’s funny from the start, you will hate this film, while even if you do find it funny initially, I can guarantee that it will become hideously boring and repetitive within 20 minutes of the start.

Now, away from the disappointing comedy, the story is a little better. Again, it’s totally and utterly predictable, with the only shocks coming towards the end where you see the scriptwriters’ desperate attempts to make the film last a little longer, but it does manage to be quite entertaining.

It’s almost an example of so-bad-it’s-good, but it’s not quite that terrible, instead it’s a case of so-dumb-it’s-fun, meaning it gives you a simple story that you can watch with little or even no thought whatsoever, and seeing as it’s not particularly annoying, you won’t feel frustrated, meaning it’s a relatively relaxed watch.

Overall, this film gets a 5.7, because despite its good points and parodies, its comedy was so disappointing that it took away the one thing you’d expect to be good from this film.