Fun Mom Dinner Review

2 stars of vaguely amusing cliches.

Fun Mom Dinner is directed by Alethea Jones (A History of Radness) and written by Julie Rudd. Both are making their feature film debut here and unfortunately the lack of experience is very evident.

“Looks like we might have targeted the wrong vessel.”

Emily (Katie Aselton – The Gift, Black Rock) is unhappy with her life. Her husband Tom (Adam Scott – The Aviator, Parks and Recreation) has lost interest and is barely civil and her children are hard work. Her best friend Kate (Toni Collette – The Sixth Sense, Unlocked) is in a similar predicament. Although her husband Andrew (Ron Huebel – Baywatch, How to be a Latin Lover) is a little more understanding, her twin boys Harry (Caleb Paddock – Adult Beginners) and Henry (Matthew Paddock – Sleep, Wake, Forget) make her life difficult and she hates to socialize with the other moms, meaning she is a social outcast.

Fellow moms Jamie (Molly Shannon – The Layover, The Little Hours), who is obsessed with Instagram, and Melanie (Bridget Everett – Patty Cake$, Trainwreck) an over enthusiastic volunteer at the school decide to invite Emily out for a “fun mom dinner”, a night out without having to worry about husbands and kids.

Emily insists upon bringing Kate, much to the annoyance of Melanie and Jamie, but apparently all differences can be solved by smoking pot in a car park for five minutes. I think maybe they just inadvertantly found the solution to world peace.

What follows is a predictable night out, doing stupid stuff, wearing stupid clothes and smoking lots of pot, while the husbands are left to deal with the kids. Obviously also thrown into the mix is handsome bartender Luke, who hits on Emily, thus giving the world another chance to revel in how much Adam Levine (Sing Street, Begin Again) fancies himself.

Fun Mom Dinner is undeniably about moms having dinner, but the fun is woefully lacking. There are a couple of amusing moments, but for the most part it’s just all a bit embarrassing. The acting is fine, but the script is so thin and the characters so underdeveloped that they didn’t really have much to go at. It’s quite clear that the message that there is more to moms than being a mom, is a valid one, but the delivery is very disappointing.

If you do want to watch something in this new all female comedy genre then there are far better examples out there than this.

“God, it feels so good just to be the old me for a few hours. You know, not like Mommy or anything, just Emily.”

Fun Moms Dinner is available now on Digital Download.