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Cube stars as confirmed bachelor Nick, whose only joys come from his sports-collectible store and the lavish new Lincoln Navigator that he has just purchased. One day, he spots divorcee party-planner Suzanne (Nia Long) across the street and instantly falls in love. There is a problem–actually, two of them; her two kids, Lindsey (Aleisha Allen) and Kevin (Phillip Daniel Bolden), is insanely protective of their mother and, convinced that their father is going to return, ward off any potential suitors with the kinds of elaborate contraptions that any two preteen children could rig up in a moment, provided that they are experts in special-effects design. Nick isn’t keen on children but when Suzanne’s ex is unable to take the kids for New Year’s, he graciously agrees to drive the two of them up to Vancouver, where Suzanne is working a party(apparently she is either the greatest party planner since Martha Stewart or no one in Canada knows how to throw a quality shindig), in order to score some points with her. Needless to see, the little urchins don’t like this at all and do whatever they can to disrupt the trip.

A film with wit might have concentrated on the normal frustrations that inevitably occur when people are crammed in the same car for a 300-mile trip–the very things that made “Planes, Trains and Automobiles,” the most obvious of inspirations on display here, so memorably amusing. Alas, this is not a film with wit so we get to see such sights as the kids kicking Nick in the genitals, steal his car and smash it up, slip a corkscrew in his jacket so he can get busted by airport security, run away and hop a freight train and splatter the insides of his car with any number of unpleasant fluids. Oh, they also stick a “HELP US” sign in the window so a mad trucker (M.C. Gainey) can stalk them under the delusion that Cube is a kidnapper. Clearly, this is a film that comes from people whose view of children is either clueless at best or diseased and hateful at worst. It should probably come as no surprise to discover that “Are We There Yet?” has been directed by Brian Levant, whose first effort was the similar-in-tone “Problem Child 2 .

Almost as repulsive as the behavior of the children (and trust me, they make the little brat from “Elektra” seem cuddly by comparison) is the way that the film attempts to make them seem sympathetic in time for the incredibly forced “happy” ending. It seems that they are lashing out because they are hurt about the divorce and we are even treated to the would-be tear-jerking scene where the brats run off to their daddy’s home and see him sitting in the living room with another woman and an adorable infant. We are supposed to be moved at the plight of the kids and angry at the father that abandoned them but I fear that my thoughts were somewhat different; based on what we have seen from the children, I not only applaud Dad’s decision to flee but I stand in awe of the fact that he was able to do so without taking an axe to his family beforehand. Cube also gets his own unconvincing conversion as well when his precious car finally goes up in flames and he tells the kids that he forgives them because they are really good kids and it was only a meaningless material possession. Forget the fact that these are unlikely sentiments from a guy whose business is based on meaningless material possessions–for a character to just simply overlook or forget all the other traumas that were perpetrated upon him by those same kids could only be explained if the movie in question were titled “Memento 2 .

Jam-packed with one-note performances, dreary visuals, lame dialogue (what can you say about a script where the best line may be “Who wants to go to Vancouver?”) and the kind of tired cliches that you thought had finally fallen out of favor (including urination jokes, horny-grandma jokes and sing-alongs to old Motown tunes), “Are We There Yet?” is an embarrassment to the family films in general and Ice Cube in particular. Anyone who has displayed any sort of admiration for either one should treat it like the plague and stay far, far away. For those of you who think I am overexaggerating its lousiness, I can only hope that you enjoy the film with your brood. I especially hope that you enjoy the ride home afterwards.

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originally posted: 01/21/05 16:02:59
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