Netflix And Chill: Kinda Pregnant (2025)

When I saw the trailer for this latest Amy Schumer comedy I must say that I wasn't keen to see it. It didn't look good, but I knew I would inevitably get around to it sooner or later. Well, here we are, much sooner than I expected. And let me start off by just saying that Kinda Pregnant is actually kinda funny.

Schumer plays Lainy Newton, a woman who is thrown for a bit of a loop when her best friend, Kate (Jillian Bell), falls pregnant as Lainy sees her life fall apart. Her boyfriend (Damon Wayans Jr.) turns out to be no good, and Kate ends up sharing a lot of her time with another mum-to-be, Shirley (Lizze Broadway). Trying on a fake maternity bump, Lainy is immediately uplifted by the reactions of strangers around her, which is why she decides to repeat the experience, eventually heading to a yoga class for pregnant women, where she meets Megan (Brianne Howey). The pair fast become firm friends, which means that Lainy has to keep up the charade of being pregnant, even when she starts to develop a relationship with Megan's brother-in-law, Josh (Will Forte). 

Co-written by Schumer and Julie Paiva, Kinda Pregnant is directed by Tyler Spindel, who seems to have generally improved with each subsequent feature that he's helmed (although he's also been the director on a Rob Schneider TV special, but bills have got to be paid, I guess). It clocks in at about 97 minutes, paces the gags well on the way to a predictable third act, and actually has something running underneath all of the comedy that speaks to how women are treated differently, and have different expectations placed on them, when they have, or are about to have, children.

Schumer has fun in the lead role, whether being in appropriate in front of the classroom full of children she is teaching or being forgetful about the pregnant status she is showing to the world, and many laughs are shared with Bell, Howey, and Broadway. There's also a bit of scene-stealing from Urzila Carlson, who is hilariously blunt and ridiculous for a lot of the runtime, and Wayans Jr. is a very amusing jackass. Forte gets to be super-sweet throughout, and he does a great job of that, while Chris Geere, Alex Moffat, and Joel David Moore are all good fun as three very different husbands/expectant fathers.

A lot of the jokes are obvious, and most of them revolve around pratfalls or people saying the wrong thing at the wrong time, but they still made me laugh, and one or two made me laugh hard (a silly little gag about a restaurant band name was my favourite, I won't spoil it here, despite it just being very silly). This is easy enough to throw on and enjoy for the disposable entertainment it is, and it is the best thing that Amy Schumer has been Amy Schumer-y in for years.

6/10

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Netflix And Chill: The Out-Laws (2023)

While I was pleasantly surprised to see that The Out-Laws, the latest comedy feature to drop on Netflix, had a very reasonable 95-minute runtime, I was even more surprised to soon discover that it was also quite funny. A lot of that depends on your tolerance for Adam Devine, who does his usual schtick here (but dialled down slightly), but if you enjoy the leads then you should have some fun with this.

Devine plays Owen Browning, a happy bank manager who is about to get married to Parker McDermott (Nina Dobrev). Although Owen has never met Parker's parents, they end being able to change their plans and ensure a visit just in time for the wedding. That means Owen has to try and bond with Billy (Pierce Brosnan) and Lilly (Ellen Barkin) in a very short space of time, which means . . . alcohol. After an evening of drinking and conversation, Owen spends his next workday hungover, and his day gets much worse when his bank is robbed. The robbers knew every part of his security system, and they seemed very familiar with Own. Could the prospective in-laws be bank-robbing outlaws?

If I had looked into the filmographies of everyone involved here then I doubt I would have given it a chance already. It's the first feature from writer Evan Turner, and the first non-sequel feature from writer Ben Zazove (who previously helped to pen Gnomeo & Juliet 2: Sherlock Gnomes). Director Tyler Spindel is a name I should have recognised, having given us the awfulness of The Wrong Missy back in 2020. Despite their dubious backgrounds, however, everyone comes together well to make something well-paced and full of decent gags. The emphasis is much more on the comedy than any action, but it sketches out enough details throughout to keep things feeling as plausible as they need to be.

While Devine is fun in his main role, he's helped enormously by sharing so much of the screentime with Brosnan and Barkin, both seeming to enjoy themselves amidst all the silliness. Brosnan is particularly fun, using his twinkly-eyed Irish charm to full effect, but he and Barkin are always very much a couple who complete one another. Dobrev does okay in her smaller role, predictably placed in danger at least once, and Michael Rooker takes on the role of the determined cop out to catch the bank robbers, and suspecting that it could have been an inside job. Poorna Jagannathan is an entertaining villain, although not really ever very threatening, and the rest of the supporting cast provides some great additional value. Not only do you get fun little moments for Dean Winters, Lil Rel Howery, Blake Anderson, and Lauren Lapkus (a LOT more amusing here than she was in The Wrong Missy, but you get some effortless scene-stealing from the wonderful Richard Kind and Julie Hagerty, playing Neil and Margie Browning, Owen's parents.

Surprisingly good for this kind of thing, certainly compared to a number of other Netflix comedy films that they've released over the past few years, The Out-Laws is as easy to enjoy as it is easy to predict. It's also a very easy one to choose when you're looking for a simple bit of fun entertainment to while away some time. I doubt we'll remember it a few years from now, as is the way with most of the streaming content that somehow feels less substantial than the films and shows released via more traditional means (e.g. does anyone else remember Hemlock Grove?), but it's here now, and that's the main thing. Apparently.

7/10

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Netflix And Chill: The Wrong Missy (2020)

Tyler Spindel is an actor who has recently built up his filmography with a number of directing jobs (including Father Of The Year, a film with the same lead). I don't think it's really fair to dismiss his potential talent just yet, because he at least shows a minimal degree of competency behind the camera, but it's fair to say that he needs to pick some better projects to work on if he wants to improve in his field.

The Wrong Missy is a star vehicle for David Spade. And I know that sentence is enough to scare away many sane movie fans. But it gets worse. The plot is all about how his character, Tim, somehow accidentally invites the wrong woman, Missy (Lauren Lapkus), along to a work retreat he is attending in Hawaii. Spade is trying to make a good impression, of course. He has an unbelievable attractive ex, of course. And if you are already starting to suspect that Missy may be annoying and disruptive in a way that leads to some valuable life lessons and potential resolutions for the characters then give yourself a cookie.

Unlike many people, I tend to enjoy the screen presence of people such as Spade. I still watch Adam Sandler movies (and not just Uncut Gems), I'll throw on some older Rob Schneider film if wanting something undemanding that will give me occasional chuckles, and Spade is part of that group. I can see why every single one of them would annoy people, but they frequently do enough to keep me moderately entertained. It's a low bar, I know, but it is what it is.

The Wrong Missy is pretty bad, even for a David Spade movie. He hasn't done anything solid in many years now (perhaps Joe Dirt being the last one that made me laugh enough to actually consider it one I enjoy, and own), and I have no reason to believe that he's suddenly going to start worrying about the quality of his output while being paid for crap like this. He's not helped by the weak script, from Chris Pappas and Kevin Barnett, and the film also suffers from the fact that it doesn't compensate for the leads, and material, with a better supporting cast. Schneider appears in a small role, Nick Swardson has a main role, and they're really the only ones worth mentioning. Oh, Sarah Chalke is the gorgeous ex, and always a welcome presence.

Although Spade is doing his usual stuff, it's all the more irritating when juxtaposed alongside the nonsense from Lapkus. I cannot recall seeing Lapkus in much, and this has not made me a fan. Her characters is made to be far too grating, unbalancing the whole film because you cannot believe that anyone would give her more than a minute of their time. By the time you get to the expected changes of heart in the third act, it's all just too hard to swallow.

If it wasn't clear enough already, I do not often have high standards when it comes to mainstream comedy movies. This film didn't even manage to meet those.

3/10

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Netflix And Chill: Father Of The Year (2018)

There's very little original in Father Of The Year. Even the title feels very familiar. It's another Happy Madison production, which means you get the usual crudity and silliness, and the usual selection of familiar faces (including David Spade in a main role).

Spade, stretching himself to the very limit of his acting abilities by attempting to maintain an accent (Boston, I think) throughout, plays the drunk and decrepit Wayne, a fully-fledged loser of a man who has somehow managed to have a son on the verge of great success. That son, Ben (Joey Bragg), is home to visit before he heads off for his new life in New York. He is accompanied by his friend, Larry (Matt Shively), and things start to get difficult when Ben and Larry start to discuss which of their fathers would win in a fight. Larry's father, Mardy (Nat Faxon), is quite the passive individual, but that doesn't matter to Wayne when he hears about the argument.

Am I going to tell you that I didn't laugh at Father Of The Year? No, I am not. There were some moments that amused me, but more because I am easily amused than any great crafting of comedy on display. I am sure that many more people will watch this without the shadow of a smile passing across their lips but I chuckled on a few occasions, particularly during scenes that involved Faxon.

Director Tyler Spindel, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Brandon Cournoyer, shows no interest at all in the characters or the environment in which the gags take place. The script is juvenile and careless, with an unearned turn in the final act that is based upon the ridiculous idea that Spade's character is an idiot who is also actually a good man (except, spoiler alert, he does very little to actually show that).

I've already mentioned that I enjoyed the scenes with Faxon more than others, Spade is bearable in his role (IF you can bear him in any role, and I know some people can't), Bragg and Shively are both fine in their roles, and the screen is at least brightened up whenever Bridgit Mendler is onscreen, saddled as she is with the role of the hometown crush that Bragg may try to reconnect with. Mary Gillis is the only other cast member worth mentioning, playing an elderly woman who has her sights on Shively's character (the younger character sleeping with a much older woman is a fairly common trope in the Happy Madison comedies).

Fans of this type of film will know what they're getting, to some degree, although this is worse than a lot of other, easier, films you could choose to kill time. And I don't imagine anyone ever wanting to revisit it.

4/10

This is still the best David Spade movie. Buy it here.
Americans can get a nice llama/Kronk set here.