Family fun in "RV"

By Megan Bakker

The Collegian

Generally when a movie is billed as a “family comedy” it brings up the same feelings as the infamous “family night”— a couple of bored hours spent shifting uncomfortably while dad cracks one or two terrible jokes.

The movie “RV” is not like that.

While the Munros are uncomfortable — even miserable — in each other’s presence, it never translates into painfulness for the viewer.

Robin Williams stars as Bob Munro, the head of a classic disconnected family with a modern twist: Instead of slamming doors when characters get frustrated with each other, they all drown each other out with MP3 players. Hello technology age indeed. Munro, in order to save his job, has to cancel the family trip to Hawaii to make an important merger meeting in Colorado. But rather than simply blowing off his family, as any real-life disconnected, workaholic father would do, Williams decides to hide this information.

He rents an RV and tells his wife Jamie (Cheryl Hines) that camping would be a great way to bring the family closer together. Understandably upset, they grab their MP3 players, climb into the RV and off they go on a whirlwind of adventures that usually accompaning this type of film.

Rounding off the cast is Josh Hutchinson, who plays younger son Carl Munro (most recently in “Zathura”), and pop star Joanna “JoJo” Levesque, who plays older daughter Cassie Munro. Despite starting her career as another cookie-cutter teenybopper ala Lindsay Lohan, Levesque displays rather good comic timing and decent acting skills. But then again, she’s in a role she excels at — the teenager with attitude.

Perhaps after a few more acting classes, she’ll have a shot at a career once she gets too old for the MTV audiences.

Of course the center of the movie is Robin Williams, who acts, well, like Robin Williams. His serious acting roles aside, as a comedian Williams perpetually comes off as needing a sit-down at the kids table with the other hyperactive eight-year-olds. And this is not a bad thing. The movie flies by incredibly quickly, carried in part by Williams, and an actor with less energy would have easily fallen behind. He provides most of the movie’s humor, both by hamming it up and by playing bumbling foil to the rest of his almost-unrealistically quick-witted family.

Overall, the movie was an enjoyable way to spend an afternoon, with several stand-out comedic moments and an ending that avoided most of the usual clichés that come with family bonding movies. No terrible jokes from dad in this one.

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