Hell Baby

After years of shrugging off their “schlocky,” if very profitable films like Night At The Museum and Herbie: Fully Loaded, Thomas Lennon and Ben Garant presented Hell Baby to Sundance by proudly declaring that, this time, they got to make a movie they wanted. And while that’s exciting for The State and Reno 911 fans in theory, in practice, the movie they wanted is another horror spoof in an increasingly long line of them, the story of a couple (Rob Corddry and Leslie Bibb) who battle evil spirits with the help of Lennon and Garant’s horny Vatican priests, a-sent-a by-a the Pope-a. In due course, possessed “bitches be trippin’,” and demonic babies be getting punched, and so on and so Scary Movie. Still, maybe seeing so many comedy pals (like Keegan-Michael Key, Michael Ian Black, Paul Scheer, and Rob Huebel) all in one place is enough to overlook those savage early reviews that compare Hell Baby unfavorably to Marlon Wayans’ A Haunted House and give it a chance. And if not, well, at least Hell Baby should make for an interesting chapter in Lennon and Garant’s next book.