Today’s Prayer Focus
MOVIE REVIEW

The Watch

also known as “Neighborhood Watch”
MPA Rating: R-Rating (MPA) for some strong sexual content including references, pervasive language and violent images.

Reviewed by: Russell Emory
CONTRIBUTOR

Moral Rating: Extremely Offensive
Moviemaking Quality:
Primary Audience: Adults
Genre: Sci-Fi Comedy
Length: 1 hr. 42 min.
Year of Release: 2012
USA Release: July 27, 2012 (wide—3,000+ theaters)
DVD: November 13, 2012
Copyright, Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporationclick photos to ENLARGE Copyright, Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation Copyright, Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation Copyright, Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation Copyright, Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation Copyright, Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation
Relevant Issues
Copyright, Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation

male-bonding

pervasive sexual crudity and vulgarity

“VOTING” FOR BAD MOVIES—Every time you buy a movie ticket or rent a video you are casting a vote telling Hollywood “That’s what I want.” Why does Hollywood continue to promote immoral programming? Are YOU part of the problem? Answer

Alien invasion

What does the Bible say about intelligent life on other planets? Answer

Are we alone in the universe? Answer

Does Scripture refer to life in space? Answer

questions and answers about the origin of life

Featuring Jonah HillFranklin
Ben StillerEvan
Vince VaughnBob
Richard Ayoade … Jamarcus
Billy Crudup
Rosemarie DeWitt
R. Lee Ermey
Will Forte … Sergeant Bressman
See all »
Director Akiva Schaffer
Producer 21 Laps Entertainment
Twentieth Century Fox
See all »
Distributor
Distributor: Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. Trademark logo.
20th Century Studios
, a subsidiary of The Walt Disney Studios, a division of The Walt Disney Company

When I do a review of other people’s work, I try to be constructive and helpful, and I always try to say something nice, especially if I don’t particularly like or enjoy that work. I am having a very hard time doing that with “The Watch.” The movie stars Ben Stiller as Evan Trautwig, a Costco store manager in small-town Ohio. Also, along for the ride is Vince Vaughn as Bob, Jonah Hill as Franklin, Richard Ayoade as Jamarcus, Billy Crudup as Evan’s “creepy neighbor,” and Rosemarie DeWitt as Evan’s wife Abby.

Evan is a busy man; he has started many clubs in his small Ohio town, a Spanish club and running club, as examples. He leads a seemingly mundane life until the night security guard at his Costco is murdered on duty. Evan is motivated by his employee’s murder and the lack of interest in solving the case by the police to start a neighborhood watch. Evan is joined by Bob, Franklin, and Jamarcus as the initial group. Evan is intent on “cleaning” up the streets of his town. Bob, Franklin, and Jamarcus, on the other hand, are interested in hanging out in Bob’s “man cave” and drinking beer.

It turns out that the Costco is hiding a secret, as is each character in the story. Evan can’t talk to his wife and starts these clubs as a way to avoid her and their issues. Bob hides the fact that he has a very dysfunctional relationship with his daughter. Franklin has a serious lack in social skills and looks to Bob and Evan as sort of father figures. This line of thinking plays out when Franklin is caught in the middle of an argument between Bob and Evan. The Costco’s secret is that it is ground zero for an incoming alien invasion.

The alien storyline plays itself out while The Watch is ridiculed by the cops and the citizens of the town. One incident has a group of teenagers call in a prank to The Watch, only to ambush them at the local high school football stadium with eggs. There is also a scene where they find a metal orb in a gentleman’s yard, and are cussed out and threatened by the gentleman who is played by R. Lee Ermey. The neighborhood watch is looked at as a joke, and the “funny” thing is they are Earth’s only hope.

If there is one redeeming quality of “The Watch,” it is that Evan is encouraged to communicate with his wife, which he does, and it leads to a stronger relationship between them. Other than that, there is not much going on here. This flick is vulgar. Usually in these reviews there is a profanity count. I could not keep track of the number of profanities in this movie and still focus on the very thin plot. I don’t think this movie goes two minutes without someone uttering the f-word or a variation of it. It was almost like they had a checklist of profanities and tried to use every one as many times as they could.

There are also two sexual scenes—one where Evan and The Watch come home and Evan’s wife is in lingerie in their front dining room. The other is while investigating Evan’s “creepy” neighbor on the suspicion that he is an alien, they learn that he hosts orgy’s in his basement. The scene is no more than five minutes but they manage to show enough.

There is not much substance in this movie, at all. I was hoping for at least some redeeming comedic scenes between Stiller and Vaughn, but was very disappointed. I even thought the idea of a Costco as ground zero for an alien invasion was quirky, but soon did not care, once the movie started going. The movie felt like a studio executive rejected a “Ghostbusters” reboot and the writers decided to make the ghosts aliens and the ghostbusters neighborhood watch. The movie felt lazy and very uninspired. Even the aliens were lazy. Scenes with them were ripped off from movies like “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” “Predator,” and “Alien.” Also, the idea of the aliens harkened back to “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” or “V” (the TV series and earlier 80’s miniseries).

I really can’t recommend this movie to anyone for any reason. It is just not a good movie, and it is highly offensive. I would try to come up with some quippy line here using the title of the movie, but, honestly, if you miss this movie, you won’t miss much.

Violence: Heavy to Extreme / Profanity: Extreme—“G-damn” (5), OMG (4), “Jesus” (3), “f” words (50+), and numerous other vulgar sexual words and phrases / Sex/Nudity: Heavy to Extreme

See list of Relevant Issues—questions-and-answers.


Viewer CommentsSend your comments
Positive

none

Negative
Negative—This was the most offensive movie! We only saw it because of the previews, which looked to be hilarious, being a science fiction movie about a group of funny guys trying to kill aliens. We knew it’d be ridiculous, but thought it would be funny. The entire movie was filled with curse words, dirty references to sex, a blatant sexual orgy scene with nudity, horrific bloody murder scenes, etc., etc. Also, the music background was filled with curse words, loud rock music, etc.

Fortunately, there were very few people in attendance at the 10:10pm show (less than 30), so maybe the word has gotten out about how awful and debase the show is. No wonder awful, horrific things happen in the world (such as the theater massacre in Colorado) when Hollywood spews out such filth for people to view. Afterward, “movie stars” are among the first to make public statements about their “shock” and “sadness” about such events! The actors in this particular movie (as well as the technical crew) should be ashamed they took part in the making of this movie, and what “legacy” they are creating for themselves, as well as how they are helping to spread immorality in this world.

From a financial viewpoint, maybe if “The Watch” loses money at the box office then “Hollywood” will see that it is not worth it to produce trash.
My Ratings: Moral rating: Extremely Offensive / Moviemaking quality: 1
Don, age 45 (USA)
Negative—Vulgar to the point of being unwatchable. Deeply regret seeing it.
My Ratings: Moral rating: Extremely Offensive / Moviemaking quality: 1
Brian Graves, age 43 (USA)
Negative—This movie extended the sexually explicit boundaries further than I’ve ever seen in an R rated movie. The number of F bombs and references to male genitalia were nauseating. In my opinion, the orgy scene was a new low, even for Hollywood. It included homosexual acts, and a variety of sexual images that are new to my brain. Don’t be fooled into thinking that, because some of the leading actors have done decent movies in the past, that this one is decent, too. I loved “Meet the Parents” It made me a Ben Stiller fan; but “The Watch” is the raunchiest movie I’ve ever seen. I loved Jonah Hill in “Moneyball,” but the profanity that spewed out of his mouth in this movie was stunningly disappointing… to put it mildly.

I deeply regret spending the $1.27 I paid to rent this move, and the 2 hours I wasted to watch it. It definitely changed my mind about the leading actors. Shame on me for taking a chance on it and participating in this trash. Romans 1 comes to mind, regarding a seared conscience. Is there no limit to the profanity that Hollywood will produce? I shutter to think what movies will be like in another 20 years… or even next month.
My Ratings: Moral rating: Extremely Offensive / Moviemaking quality: 2
Stephen, age 41 (USA)
Movie Critics
“…‘Watch’ out for this comedy clunker… it stinks. …it is a disease-carrying mosquito of film comedy.”
James Verniere, The Boston Herald
“…raunchy …has plenty of time for penis jokes… at least half of the gags in ‘The Watch’ involve the region below the belt and above the knee. …”
Gary Thompson, Philadelphia Daily News
“…A lowbrow, lame-brained mash-up of buddies-on-patrol comedy and sci-fi actioner, held together (barely) by an endless string of penis jokes, this exercise in high-concept vulgarity boasts a solid cast with a sharp sense of improv, the effect of which is to make the various domestic subplots and product placements feel like even more of a waste of space.”
Justin Chang, Variety
“…With its endless phallic jokes—references to Magnum condoms, green alien blood with the texture of semen, panic about infertility (Evan is afraid to tell his wife that he is “shooting blanks”) and well-endowed invaders with brains in their genitals—‘The Watch’ is the latest in a wave of comedies drenched in male sexual anxiety. …”
Stephen Holden, The New York Times
“…a manic, patched-together… mess of a comedy… The Watch emphasizes over and over again in happy-dirty guy talk that borders on obsession, these neighborhood watchmen are primarily united by their R-rated equipment. Their penises. And by the wondrous stuff those genitals are capable of, alone or in the company of others. If this amateur justice league spent as much time analyzing clues as they did analyzing their junk, in every slang variation available in the Urban Dictionary, the murder mystery in The Watch could have been solved on the first night of surveillance.”
Lisa Schwarzbaumm, Entertainment Weekly
“…‘The Watch’ is aggressively potty-mouthed… It’s so determined to be crude, vulgar and offensive that after a while I grew weary. Abbott and Costello used to knock out funnier movies on this exact intellectual plane without using a single F, S, C, P or a-word.”
Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

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