Cheaper by the Dozen 2

Steve Martin's entertaining vehicle with young people and agreeable actors . The film deals about a happy family , the father (Steve Martin) is a notorious coach and the mother (Bonnie Hunt) is a writer and with twelve sons (Tom Welling, Piper Perabo, Hilary Duff..) . In the first part dealt with Tom who received a new offer as a trainer of a famous football team and she obtained her dream for the publishing the book titled : ¨Cheaper by the dozen¨. With the new job , they had to change from a small city to the big town . This second installment is set two years after the events in the previous film concerns The Bakers, this time the Baker family begins to undergo many changes, starting with Lorraine (Hilary Duff) and her desire to study in New York. Their oldest daughter Nora (Piper Perabo) is now married to Bud McNulty (Jonathan Bennett) and heavily pregnant. They intend to move to Houston because of Bud's new job promotion . While on vacation, find themselves competing with a rival family of eight children whose stiff father is Jimmy (Eugene Levy) , an old contender to Tom . Steve Martin ought to keep the familiar order involving in his own home while at the same time training the team to win the rival family . And along the way , the protagonist suffer numerous jokes and misfortunes in charge of the brothers . This Christmas The More... The Scarier! Growing pains? They've got twelve of them!This Christmas, you better watch out! This Christmas You Better Watch Out! Same Big Family... Even Bigger Adventure.

The picture is pretty entertaining and amusing , the film contains bemusing scenes and continuous laughters and various chuckles with lots of fun . It's a new version of the classic film with similar title featured by Clifton Webb and Myrna Loy . Although this movie is loosely based on a book by that title "Cheaper By The Dozen" about a real-life family, the book was written by one of the sons, Frank B. Gilbreth Jr., along with his sister, Ernestine Gilbreth Carey. Although this film is based on that same book that inspired the 1950 film , the only element it retains from the original is the idea of there being 12 children in one family. Even the names of the characters are changed. The picture belongs to numerous family sub-genre whose maxim representation is ¨Yours , mine and ours¨ with Henry Fonda and Lucille Ball and recently remade with Dennis Quaid and Rene Russo . As trivia , to add the following one : when the "Cheaper by the Dozen" movies were made, neither Steve Martin nor Bonnie Hunt, who played the parents of 12 children, had ever had a child in real life . Based on the real life Gilbreth family, in fact the name Gilbreth appears sometimes throughout the film . As Gilbreth family on whom the film was based had 6 boys and 6 girls ; also, they did not have any twins . All the children were single births and the father regretted this because he felt multiple births to be more efficient . Steve Martin , as always , plays as excessive manner , making an authentic recital , if you like Martin's crazy interpretation , you'll enjoy this one . However , Tim Allen, Kurt Russell, Mel Gibson and Tom Hanks were considered for the role of Tom Baker. Besides , there appears as sons , known and young actors as Tom Welling (Smallville) , Hilary Duff (LizzyMcGuire) , Piper Perabo (Bar Coyote) and other kiddies as Taylor Lautner , Alyson Stoner , Jonathan Bennett, Jacob Smith , Liliana Mumy ,Morgan York , among others . The yarn was well realized , though without originality , and and with the same equipment was shot the first part . The motion picture was professionally directed by Adam Shankman : Hocus Pocus 2 , The pacifier, Rock of ages , Bedtime Stories , Wedding plans , Hairspray , A Walk to Remember. The flick will appeal to family films enthusiasts and Steve Martin fans.

I guess it's been a long time since Steve played the banjo on the Muppet Show. I have really enjoyed some of Steve's movies..."Roxanne", "Being There", etc. but he seems to have lost his touch in this one.

This movie is still very watchable mind you, but the "former" Steve is missing. It seems there were too many gags (ie; dog & crotch, dangling from balcony) and not enough real comedy like we're used to from Steve (such as the nose jokes in Roxanne).

Also this movie has nothing to do with the 1950 "Cheaper by the Dozen" (or it's original sequel "Belles on Their Toes")...other than 12 kids of course. It seemed more akin to "The Great Outdoors" or "Meatballs".

There were some cute scenes however: The two kids crush & the dads both spying on them in the theatre, and nearly giving birth in a canoe I found amusing. It would have been a lot more amusing had she actually given birth in the canoe though.

Oddly my favourite actress in this was the little girl (can't remember her name right now) who had the crush on the little boy. She was really cute and engaging. I hope she appears in more movies.

Thankfully, I did not pay money to see this (thanks to the wonders of bittorrent) But I will definitely be buying the DVD. It is a good family movie, just not up to my expectations for Steve Martin.

Possibly I should not endorse downloading, but movie-going is difficult where I live as it entails a long, costly ferry trip. Otherwise I probably would have seen this in a theatre.

As a teenage girl, and a fan of the first movie, I found the sequel to Cheaper by the Dozen to be above my expectations. Usually, movie sequels are a disappointment, I have found, as was with Shrek 2, for example, but I found that Cheaper by the Dozen 2 was hilarious and a really good movie outlining the importance of family and family values. Yes, it was slightly predictable, as these movies often are, but I found that was strongly over-ridden by the comedy and 'slap-stick' that happened throughout the film to make it so entertaining. All the family had matured since that first film and it was interesting to see what the children had grown up to be like, and how much they had changed since the first film. I recommend this movie to fans of the first film, or anyone who just wants to see a light-hearted, 'feel-good' and all-over great movie.

'Cheaper by the Dozen 2' is pretty much the typical family comedy that has nothing new to offer. That does not mean that the film is absent of entertainment. It pretty much follows the usual formula with the regular ingredients. The slapstick and jokes are expected but still amusing. There are some funny adult jokes too. The film has heart and that's what works for it. Shankman and his cast and crew must have had a great time (as was also apparent on the DVD extras). Steve Martin and Eugene Levy are good. Martin has played the comedic family dad perhaps more than a dozen times and he has become quite skilled at it. The extremely talented Bonnie Hunt is criminally underused but she has an effective presence, nonetheless. Carmen Electra is a surprise. She plays a hot mom but not the clichéd one, rather one that is compassionate, gentle and caring. Electra does a good job and proves that she can do more than being just an airhead or a seductress. Piper Perabo is also underused. Jaime King is very pretty. Hilary Duff plays sort of a spoilt brat (which is a change from her sweet pretty girl image) but her acting is quite bad and she needs to eat. The child actors were all fun to watch. Overall, it's all goofy family fun and quite enjoyable when watching with the family.

Tom and Kate (Steve Martin, Bonnie Hunt) decide to take the whole family on a summer vacation to Lake Winnetka, but it soon turns into a competition between their family and that of Tom's arch-rival Jimmy Murtaugh (Eugene Levy).

Cheaper by the Dozen 2 is a harmless and bland sequel. It offers a few laughs but not enough to sustain its running time. The original film was an okay family film, nothing special. The sequel is more or less the same and it also makes for a decent family film. I was expecting a little more though. There are a few interesting subplots but the main premise is very silly. I know it's a family movie and all but why did the story have to be so generic? Since the script is weak there is a lack of character development, the film is kind of boring. There are a few funny gags and performances but they aren't good enough to save the movie.

The acting is okay and only a couple people give good performances. The best performance is given by Alyson Stoner. Her character goes through the most development and she handles it pretty well. Liliana Mumy and Morgan York also give good performances though they don't get a lot of screen time. The strength of the comedy should have been the rivalry between Steve Martin and Eugene Levy. Levy is only mildly funny while Steve Martin is not funny at all. He just tries too hard and it comes off as annoying. Bonnie Hunt gives a decent performance and she has a few funny lines. Hilary Duff gives an annoying performance as Lorraine and she's hardly in the film, which is a good thing. Carmen Electra makes for good eye candy but she doesn't do anything special. Piper Perabo and Jamie King both give decent performances. Tom Welling just gives a bland performance while Jonathon Bennett only has a few lines and his character is not developed at all.

Director Adam Shankman only does an okay job behind the camera. I like the way he captures the Baker family and their love for one another. There are some nice moments in the movie about family values and the ending is pretty nice. Besides for that, he just keeps the film bland and uninteresting while leaving out some of the Baker kids. On the one hand, I wanted the film to be longer than 90 minutes so all the characters could have been portrayed well. On the other hand, if they had kept the same story and made the film longer then the movie would have been unbearable. On a last note, compared to Yours, Mine and Ours, Cheaper by the Dozen 2 looks like a masterpiece. In the end, the movie is only average but it should make for a nice rental if you're looking for a family film. Rating 5/10