It seems there’s no stopping Garry Marshall’s terrifying cinematic rampage on our nation’s treasured holidays. Having ruined both “Valentine’s Day” and “New Year’s Eve” with his star-packed omnibus projects, the director has burned his way through the calendar, landing on “Mother’s Day.”
This time around, Julia Roberts, Jennifer Aniston, Kate Hudson, Jason Sudeikis, Britt Robertson, Margo Martindale, Timothy Olyphant, Aasif Mandvi, Sarah Chalke and Shay Mitchell, among others, are subjected to the inter connected, fake-heartwarming, holiday-themed story. It claims to be a tribute to the idea of maternal love, but it’s not heartwarming or about mothers so much.
Sure, most of the characters are parents, but it’s only nominally about motherhood. “Mother’s Day” is far more concerned with exploring the ideas of marriage, careers, single dads, the military, prejudice, jealousy, grief and clown wisdom. There are a few tossed off lines about the irreplaceability of a mother’s love, but nothing feels sincere.
The script is credited to no less than four people, and is a shoddy mish mosh of product placement for a bizarre selection of brands, from Morton’s Salt to Cadillac; there’s blatantly spoken exposition and personal psychoanalysis, terribly edited bits of dialogue stuffed in to make everything more painfully obvious — “I have abandonment issues,” a character needlessly explains.