Garry Marshall takes Julia Roberts out for Mother’s Day
In the ’80s, most films named after a holiday were of the slasher variety. There’s nothing outwardly terrifying about Mother’s Day, though—although the server at your local Applebee’s may disagree—and unfortunately, Garry Marshall’s latest, Mother’s Day, is not a slick Hollywood reboot of Troma’s 1980 slice of backwoods trash. (Although the thought of the man behind Happy Days and Laverne & Shirley taking on murderous hillbillies and their psychopathic mother would be infinitely more interesting.) As it stands, Mother’s Day is the third in Marshall’s “holiday trilogy,” following 2010’s Valentine’s Day and 2011’s New Year’s Eve. Much like Cannon’s “ninja trilogy,” the three films do not follow a particular character, but explore the concept of what the holiday means to beautiful people who have the same problems as us regular schnooks.