Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.5
Extras		2.5
Overall		3.0

Why Him? Blu-ray Movie Review

Meet the Flemings.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman March 29, 2017

It’s almost hard to remember there was a time that Bryan Cranston was known, if he was known at all, for playing hapless father Hal in the sweet if often tart situation comedy Malcolm in the Middle. Hal was in many ways a traditional sitcom Dad, kind of clueless most of the time but well meaning, but Cranston brought a rather refreshing take on an at least relatively cliché ridden character, receiving several Emmy nominations and a Golden Globe nomination for his efforts. Like a lot of actors, Cranston had scores of credits before Malcolm in the Middle brought him at least a modicum of national recognition, including a well remembered guest stint on Seinfeld and (if IMDb is to be believed) voice work on the English dub of Ghost in the Shell (in an interesting bit of synchronicity, given the impending release of the live action version). That said, few were really adequately prepared for the transformation Cranston would undergo for what has become his “real” signature role, that of Walter White in Breaking Bad: The Complete Series, a role which brought Cranston not just universal acclaim but actual awards instead of “just” nominations. Cranston has continued to stretch his thespian boundaries in the wake of Breaking Bad’s incredible impact, gaining an Academy Award nomination for his portryal of blacklisted screenwriter Dalton Trumbo, and an Emmy nomination for his work as President Lyndon Baines Johnson in All the Way, all of which begs the question of (suitably, given the film’s title) “why” Why Him??

Why Him? is built on one of the hoariest tropes in the annals of film, namely a child introducing his or her parents to an intended spouse. The list of movies exploiting this premise is long (and surprisingly varied, not necessarily limited to comedies), including such entries as Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, Meet the Parents, The Birdcage, current sensation Get Out and even the little remembered horror film You'll Like My Mother. With so many cinematic antecedents already around, one wonders what the writing crew behind this film (which includes Jonah Hill, receiving a story credit) thought they might bring to the premise that would infuse it with something new. While there's a lot of at least somewhat funny stuff running through large swaths of Why Him?, evidently, that “innovative” quality apparently boils down to the fact that in 2017 the supposedly hilarious use of nonstop obscenities and references to things like certain porn activities or automatic toilets is enough to reinvigorate a fairly tired subgenre.

Cranston portrays a kind of Hal-ish guy named Ned Fleming, a well meaning husband to wife Barb (a surprisingly restrained Megan Mullally), son Scotty (Griffin Gluck) and older daughter Stephanie (Zoey Deutch), whose nascent romance with high tech entrepreneur Laird Mayhew provides the lynch pin around which much of Why Him? hinges. It’s documented from the first scene that Laird is a kind of big, goofy horndog who isn’t above dropping the f-bomb virtually every other word and whose carnal interests rise to the top of his supposedly brilliant mind with great regularity. In a nutshell, he’s everything any concerned father would go a little crazy about if he thought his daughter were going out with someone like that.

Stephanie invites the entire family out to California to meet Laird in yet another reuse of a hoary “meet the parents” trope, but perhaps surprisingly placing the holiday festivities in the decidedly non-wintry climes of Palo Alto makes this part of an overly familiar plot setup play better than it might have, removing some of the inherent sentimentality from the enterprise, if only because (initially at least) snow isn’t falling and windows aren’t frosted with ice. Of course, the Flemings and Laird mix like oil and water, and Franco’s over the top performance frequently wrings laughs out of fairly limp writing.

The story is perhaps unavoidably vignette driven, careening from “getting to know you” antics to relatively more serious fare as Ned attempts to keep a failing business empire from his family just as the holidays approach (guess how that one turns out, given the fact that Laird is a gazillionaire). Laird wants to propose to Stephanie on Christmas, and he’s actually a decent enough sort (despite his potty mouth) to want Ned’s blessing, something Ned is absolutely against granting, and thus the parry and thrust of the middle section of the film is established.

Why Him? is certainly no classic, and any individual’s response to this material will probably depend on one’s tolerance for general silliness (example: Keegan-Michael Key is on hand as “estate manager” Gustav, a patently weirdly accented guy who repeatedly breaks into skirmishes with Laird which are a direct—and acknowledged—ripoff of similar interchanges between Inspector Clouseau and Cato in The Pink Panther). There’s also a reliance on foul mouthed outbursts to achieve laughs, which will work for some, less so for others, though to be fair, the film has some genuine laughs culled from more mundane elements. One of these is the seemingly sentient Siri-esque entity named Justine which (who?) is wired into Laird’s mansion (voiced by Kaley Cuoco), an all seeing all knowing “woman” who isn’t afraid to talk back to the humans she’s supposedly helping. My single favorite line in the film was a literal throwaway by one of Laird’s interns bathing one of Laird’s llamas (because of course Laird has llamas), which I won’t spoil here, other than to say it pretty much perfectly sums up the typical intern reaction to interning.

The film is relentlessly predictable, but the cast is so winning that some folks will end up being willing to go with the flow, grabbing whatever gusto along the way that they can. As any fan of Cranston’s work as Hal (and the somewhat more vicious version of this temperament quirk displayed by Walter White) will know, no one does exasperation quite like Cranston, and he has a field day here going through various spasms of indignation as he attempts to keep true love from really blossoming.

Why Him? Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Why Him? is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.85:1. The closing credits list the Arri Alexa as the camera of choice on this shoot, and the results are the typically sharp and clear images that are associated with this particular technology. The film's prevalent locale of a bright, sunny California helps to elevate the perkiness of the palette, especially when things venture outside, but even within the confines of Laird's super modern mansion, detail levels are typically quite high, even in less than optimal lighting conditions. A couple of sequences which are either shot purposefully softly (as in a yoga interchange between Laird and Stephanie) or in darker than average environments (as in a party sequence) feature less fulsome detail levels, as should probably be expected. There are no issues with image instability or compression anomalies.

Why Him? Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Why Him? features a nice sounding DTS-HD Master Audio 7.1 mix that obtains quite a bit of sonic energy from several source cues which fill the surround channels, as well as some of the more cacophonous moments in the field, including "crowd scenes" in Laird's home and a big party sequence. Dialogue is very cleanly rendered and the track even has some unexpected low end at a couple of select moments courtesy of some fun sound effects. Fidelity is excellent and dynamic range rather wide for a comedy.

Why Him? Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Why Him? Gag Reel (1080p; 9:58) offers some moments that are arguably as funny as anything that ended up in the film.


• 47 Minutes on the Can (1080p; 6:39) documents the shooting of the toilet set piece, and, yes, I just said toilet set piece.


• Why Gustav? (1080p; 4:23) offers a montage of Gustav moments.


• Barb Fleming: America's Mom (1080p; 5:44) profiles Megan Mullaly's character.


• Lou the Entertainer (1080p; 4:27) does much the same for the character played by a certain Cedric.


• Richard Blais: Twisted Chef (1080p; 1:46) is a brief look at that character.


• Deleted Scenes (1080p; 31:19)


• Audio Commentary by John Hamburg (Director/Co-Writer), Ian Helfer (Co-Writer) and William Kerr (Editor)


• Gallery (1080p; 3:48) offers both an Auto Advance and a Manual Advance option. The timing is for the Auto Advance option.


• Theatrical Trailer (1080p; 2:33)

Why Him? Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

This may be damning with faint praise, but I actually ended up liking Why Him? quite a bit more than I expected to. It's not exactly sophisticated comedy by any stretch, but Franco is kind of lovable as a big goofball with an uncontrollable mouth on him, and Cranston waltzes through this film without batting an eye, providing an aptly tamped down foil to Franco's more hyperbolic shenanigans. The supporting cast is colorful, and if you don't mind some frankly juvenile humor, Why Him? provides a baseline of undemanding but often funny material. Technical merits are strong, and with caveats noted, Why Him? comes Recommended.