Fatherhood

Directed by Paul Weitz

★★★

FATHERHOOD: KEVIN HART as MATT. Cr. PHILIPPE BOSSE/NETFLIX © 2021.

If you cast Alfre Woodard in a movie, you can bet your ass I’m gonna cry at some point.

Fatherhood follows Matt (Kevin Hart), as he deals with the tragic and unexpected loss of his wife, in the hours following the birth of their daughter. The film is Hart’s latest attempt at a drama film, and is leaps and bounds better than the schmaltzy The Upside. Yet, the film still finds its own ways to be manipulative. 

Immediately, we are thrown into the funeral scene for literally five seconds. The film then jumps back to the couple visiting a doctor while on vacation and finding out that their baby was coming a bit sooner than expected. Hart is, unsurprisingly, playing a character who is a bit too immature to be a father, but this time around Hart’s antics are more subdued. Although Hart's typical comedic style is present, he remains incredibly understated throughout, in one of his best performances to date, by far his best dramatic role.

Despite some interesting promise in its beginning where the film plays with time, it completely abandons any notion of creativity halfway through the first act and the cliches abound. It hits all the notes and music cues you expect it to all the way to its finale, which wraps up everything in a nice little bow. I find this especially frustrating since Fatherhood is based on a true story, and in life things don’t have a perfect ending. For a film that tries a grounded approach, this seems to undermine all the work the cast put in before.

Overall, Fatherhood succeeds, despite its frequent stumbles, thanks mostly to incredible performance and a few standout (and awards-worthy) scenes from Alfre Woodard.