The Pacifier (2005)
3/10
Dreadful and Boring
5 July 2005
Vin Diesel plays Shane Wolfe, a disgraced Navy SEAL, assigned to protect the five children of a scientist who was murdered while working on government secrets. He quickly learns that taking care of kids is going to be the hardest assignment he's ever taken.

The premise isn't very original but I was still expecting this to be a fun movie. However, The Pacifier is a lazy family film that only the kids will like. The screenwriters could have attempted to expand the audience but they didn't. They pretty much leave everyone over the age of 15 out of the fun. The movie only had one goal and that was to entertain the kids. For the most part, they succeeded even if they used cheap gags and annoying characters to get the job done. Well, I'm not too surprised the script is really weak since it was written by the same people who brought us Taxi. I know the Pacifier is supposed to be a fun, harmless movie but it was quite tortuous at times and I blame it on the lazy screenwriters.

Vin Diesel is an okay actor. I can't see him winning an Oscar anytime soon but he's better than Paul Walker. His performance here wasn't very good though. It was rather dull and it wasn't very funny either. It's not really his fault since he was probably told to play his character seriously so that in awkward situations, he would seem to be funny but it backfired and made the film more unbearable. Morgan York gave the best performance and she has the most memorable lines. Brittany Snow was okay, nothing special. Max Thieriot also gave an okay performance though I really didn't like his character. Faith Ford appears in the movie for about 15 minutes so it would be kind of pointless to see this film because of her. Lauren Graham gave an okay performance, I prefer her on Gilmore Girls though. Brad Garret was terrible since he tried way too hard to be funny and it just failed completely.

Adam Shankman directs and he does a decent job. I wouldn't say he did a good job because the movie is kind of bland and inoffensive. He really put no element of surprise and he shot the film right down the middle. I'm kind of surprised he didn't make the film better since he also directed Bringing Down the House and that film was pretty funny. Since this is strictly a kid's movie, I thought the film was very dull and not very funny. They seemed to try too hard and it didn't work out at all. They were some funny moments but not enough to sustain the running time. In the end, The Pacifier is a harmless film for kids but everyone else should skip it. Rating 4/10
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