Quickcard Review Imagine That
Directed by: Karey Kirkpatrick Cast: Eddie Murphy, Yara Shahidi, Thomas Hayden Church, Nicole Ari Parker Running Time: 1 hr. 40 mins Rating: PG Release Date: June 12, 2009
Plot: Evan (Murphy) is a successful financial executive who is obsessed with work. But it’s his week with his 7-year-old daughter (Shahidi) so now he must try and balance the two.
Who's it For? It you aren't expecting much, it's for Murphy fans who want to see him tone it down. Fathers and daughters won't get enough out of this film, which should be the entire goal of Imagine That.
OVERALL
Imagine Jim Carrey, Mike Myers, Will Ferrell … only funnier. That was Eddie Murphy. With Coming to America, Beverly Hills Cop, and Raw no one was better. But things have been different lately, just like with Imagine That. Now he's stuck in a light family movie that is supposedly to be all about a single dad finding a relationship with his daughter.
When work starts to unravel thanks to some competition from Johnny Whitefeather (Church), Evan suddenly starts to take advice from characters in his daughter’s imaginary world.
There’s no special effects it's all about the imagination. And watching people play make believe ... not that much fun. More importantly, it takes Evan way too long to ask how or why his daughter is getting all this financial info from imagination land.
Look, there are moments of sweetness, but the movie depends way too much on you thinking the word GOO-GA is hilarious. Imagine That just doesn’t make sense from the unreal like Thomas Hayden Church acting like a Native American, to the real ... like if a little girl is deathly afraid of singing, maybe you don’t give her the first solo in the school recital.
Even when Murphy let's out the voice of Donkey from Shrek when he's praying about pancakes, it's not that funny. But perhaps the most confusing part of it all? There’s Beatles cover songs throughout the entire film.
Little girls will be bored with this insanely fake financial world and Dad’s you don’t need this movie to remind you to spend time with your kids, right?
Final Score: 4/10