Baby Mama

Jeri Jacquin, Movie Maven

Coming to the screen this Friday is a film from Saturday Night Live producer Lorne Michaels along with cast member Tina Fey in “Baby Mama”.

This film is the story of Kate Holbrook (Tina Fey), a 37-year-old woman who dedicated herself to a career instead of a personal life. After finding out she doesn’t have a great chance of getting pregnant Kate goes about looking for a baby mama. Finding an agency she meets Chaffee Bicknell (Sigourney Weaver) who sends her surrogate candidate Angie (Amy Poehler).

Kate, being the organized individual that she is, goes into a nesting phase. Planning for her child’s homecoming with childproofing the house and reading everything in print. One day Kate’s world is turned upside down when her doorman Oscar (Romany Malco) brings Angie to the door with no place to live.

This is where laid-back meets brick-wall as Kate’s world is turned upside down and inside out. The reality begins on what its like to have a child in the house even if the child is in an adult’s body. But then it is Angie who takes Kate under her wing trying to show its okay to be you, have a laugh or two and find a family in the most unexpected places.

FINAL WORD: Fey plays the straight-laced Kate very well. It has a familiarity of Diane Keaton in “Baby Boom” but still good none-the-less. The hard laughs come from Amy Poehler as Angie. But, more importantly, is the two actresses together who play off of each other tremendously well.

Malco as Oscar the doorman is funny as well. If you loved him in “40-year-old-Virgin” then you can see how this role brings in the laughs. As the birthing teacher, Siobhan Fallon brings olive oil laughs with her accented character.

There are also roles from Greg Kinnear as Rob, Steve Martin as Barry and Maura Tierney as Caroline.

TUBS OF POPCORN: I give “Baby Mama” three tubs of popcorn out of five. The film is full of Saturday Night Live alumni but, with Lorne Michaels who would expect anything less. 

It isn’t full of special effects or sci-fi thrills, just a good laugh. Its tough to be the one following up “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” but it has its place for the comedy hungry crowd.