The Guilt Trip 
Starring: Barbara Streisand, Seth Rogen,
Directed by Anne Fletcher
Rated: PG-13
Run Time: 95 mins
Genre: Comedy
Opens December 19th
By Lisa Minzey of The Reel Critic.com
With less than two weeks to go for the 2012 movie release schedule, here is a comedy that doesn’t quite fit the typical holiday release film type. Director Ann Fletcher brings together a quirky, yet witty cast of characters, with the most intriguing pairing of mother and son in Barbara Streisand and Seth Rogen.
Andrew Brewster (Seth Rogen) is a former FDA scientist who has developed the cleanest of cleaning solutions and is trying to sell the product to the masses. Every meeting he has had so far has been less than lucrative, so to give it one final attempt as he’s running out of money, he plans a road trip starting on the East Coast and ending up in Las Vegas to visit every consumer distributor of household goods he can fit in. Andrew’s mother Joyce (Barbara Streisand) is his biggest fan, constantly encouraging him and dishing out the motherly guilt in heaps. Andrew stays with his mother while on the first stop of his trip where he learns about his mother’s first love, the man whom he was named after, but wasn’t his father. It breaks his heart to see his mother lonely, so he is determined to find the original Andrew and play a little matchmaker.
Once Andrew learns that Andrew Margolis (the original Andy) lives in San Francisco, he devises a plan to bring his mother along on his road trip and swing up towards the city by the bay to see if there are any sparks left between the two ex-lovers. Unbeknownst to Joyce, she enthusiastically agrees to join Andrew on the trip, and they proceed on a cross-country journey that will change their relationship forever.
In this road trip comedy, much of the mother/ son relationship story arc is rather predictable, but actually works in favor for Seth Rogen & Barbara Streisand. Rogen downplays the obnoxious overtones that he’s famous for, in favor of playing the role of character instead of his own personality. The story was endearing, humorous and quite memorable for some of Barbara’s scenes (Especially the steakhouse scene) and was based on a trip that screenwriter Dan Fogelman took with his mother. Although this film was shot entirely in Southern California, the special effects team did a superb job of making it look like an actual road trip. The only thing I find strange about the film is the timing of the release. This film is a story about the relationship between mother & son, so I would have expected a film to have been released closer to Mother’s Day, the start of the summer film season. If you are looking for a lighthearted comedy this holiday season, check out The Guilt Trip when it opens in theaters nationwide starting Wednesday December 19, 2012.
