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Baby Mama

Largely laugh-barren

By ALICIA POTTER | April 23, 2008

1.0 Stars

BABY MAMA: A string of predictable, largely laugh-barren scenarios.

Not even SNL’s whipsmart Tina Fey and Amy Poehler can save writer/director Michael McCuller’s pregnancy comedy from its fate as another condescending, self-congratulatory fantasy of maternal bliss. Fey’s uptight single exec has a wonky womb, so she pays a white-trash money grubber (Poehler) to bear her child. Shortly after the positive pee test, the surrogate moves in — it’s The Odd Couple with surging estrogen. Can a wacky makeover be far behind? Unfortunately no — ditto the string of predictable, largely laugh-barren scenarios that exploit racial and class stereotypes. Only Steve Martin as a ponytailed yogi/mogul and Sigourney Weaver as the startlingly fertile head of the surrogacy agency wield any satirical bite. Like its preggo predecessors Juno and Knocked Up, this disappointment attests that, no matter what the mother’s circumstances, babies soften our hardest edges — in this case, the comic ones too. 96 minutes | Boston Common + Fenway + Fresh Pond + Circle + suburbs

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