Film review: 'The Guilt Trip'

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Film review: ‘The Guilt Trip’

Josh Bell

Wed, Dec 19, 2012 (3:58 p.m.)

Babs came back for this?

The Guilt Trip

Seth Rogen, Barbra Streisand; Directed by Anne Fletcher; Rated PG-13
Beyond the Weekly: Official Movie Site; IMDb: The Guilt Trip; Rotten Tomatoes: The Guilt Trip

Like Jane Fonda in Monster-in-Law, Barbra Streisand has returned from a long acting hiatus to star in what must be the least challenging middle-of-the-road fare she could find. Aside from small supporting roles in Meet the Fockers and Little Fockers, Streisand hasn’t starred in a movie since 1996, and The Guilt Trip is not exactly a promising comeback.

It’s a bland, sitcom-style story about an overbearing New Jersey mother (Streisand) who nags her inventor son (Seth Rogen) over the course of a weeklong road trip. Streisand and Rogen both play obnoxious people obnoxiously, and the movie is completely devoid of worthwhile supporting characters (no other actor shows up for more than a few minutes). The jokes are weak, the plot is painfully predictable, and neither star brings any unique qualities to the performance. The movie could have been made with random basic-cable actors, and it would have been just as unremarkable.

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