Mother’s Day
A hodgepodge of loosely connected characters (played by the likes of Jennifer Aniston, Kate Hudson, Julia Roberts, Jason Sudeikis, Timothy Olyphant, Margo Martindale, Sarah Chalke and various lesser lights of the acting firmament) brace themselves for the inevitable pressure of the approaching eponymous holiday. Director Garry Marshall’s latest “holiday” movie sports a story (thrown together by him and writers Lily Hollander, Matt Walker, Tom Hines and Anya Kochoff Romano) undisturbed by any hint of the real world—does anyone but Hallmark really stress out at Mother’s Day? Has any place on Earth besides the set of this movie ever staged a parade for it, or a party with clowns and inflatable slides? It’s smug, cloying, shameless, false and sickly-sweet enough to make Billy Graham want to vomit. J.L.
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