Review: Becky

The sullen thirteen year-old title character (played by 14 year-old Lulu Wilson) is picked up by her dad (Joel McHale) to go on a trip to their family cabin some 12 months after the death of Becky’s beloved mother. She’s not enthused and is even less so when dad’s new girlfriend (Amanda Brugel) and her son show up. Things are…uh, tense as the new girlfriend’s attempts to ingratiate herself are met with eye-rolls and all-round bitchiness from young Becky. However, shit’s about to get really bad for the family once they’re at the cabin. The family are confronted by four escaped criminals, led by hulking neo-Nazi Dominick (Kevin James), who isn’t thrilled to see an interracial couple. He has other business to attend to however, as there’s a certain hidden key somewhere in or around the cabin that Dominick very much wants. And he’ll do whatever it takes to get it. He’s never met someone like Becky before though. Becky proves to be quite resourceful and frankly extremely violent for her or any other age. Robert Maillet plays the largest of Dominick’s cohorts, and the most morally conflicted (i.e. He’s a softie when it comes to kids). Ryan McDonald (not me, the C-grade Canadian actor who stole my name) plays another henchman.

 

Featuring a cast-against-type Kevin James, this 2020 genre pic from co-directors Jonathan Milott & Cary Murnion (who previously co-directed “Bushwick” with Dave Bautista) seems to have gotten a fair amount of good notice and quite a bit of buzz in some circles. Scripted by the trio of Nick Morris, and spouses Lane & Ruckus Skye it’s actually much ado about nothing, though at least James is pretty decent as the villain. Former host of TV’s “The Soup” Joel McHale is fine as the dad too, though I think comedy is still his best avenue as a performer by far.

 

Nothing much new has been brought to the table here, so much as a jumbling of familiar elements and I’m sorry, but a touch more brutality than usual isn’t enough of a new wrinkle for me. Even James’ character, much as it’s a new avenue for the actor himself, isn’t all that new or interesting. It’s pretty mediocre and utterly forgettable stuff, I just don’t see the fuss with it when its made of spare parts of a million other films. Also not helping things is that mopey lead actress Lulu Wilson doesn’t have facial expressions so much as slight variations of the same expression. It’s a tedious, one-note performance that didn’t ingratiate me to the character in the slightest. About the only remotely surprising thing here is that the big scary-looking guy (played by former wrestler Robert Maillet) turns out to be the one morally-conflicted guy among the villains. He is by default the most interesting thing here.

 

Yeah, this one did nothing for me. Despite sporting ludicrous and clichéd neck tattoos, Kevin James is fine. Joel McHale is fine, too. The film is boring and generic, and no amount of gory dislodged eyeballs could persuade me that I hadn’t seen all of these elements before and mostly better (It’s basically “Home Alone”, “Die Hard”, “The Desperate Hours”, and “Straw Dogs” all mashed together). Skip it.

 

Rating: C-  

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