The concept of parenthood has been a subject explored extensively in every conceivable medium – whether planned or accidental, the idea of adding another title to your repertoire is a fascinating concept, especially considering it is a universal topic that can be interpreted in many different ways. For one reason or another, we tend to grow very invested in stories around the challenges and triumphs that come with having a child, whether from the mother’s or father’s perspective, which can make for some genuinely charming and intriguing works. This is central to Father’s Day, in which Ivan Reitman works with screenwriters Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel to adapt the French film Les Compères by Francis Veber, moving the action to California, and updating it to a more contemporary setting. The premise is simple – Scott is the son of Collette and runs away with his girlfriend. In fear that her teenage son is going to get himself in trouble, she sets out to ask his father to go find him and bring him home. The problem is, she doesn’t quite know who his father is, as she had relationships with two men at the time, and both are blissfully unaware that they potentially fathered a child. Jack Lawrence is a mild-mannered, overly particular lawyer, while Dale Putley is a more eccentric, off-the-wall writer who is teetering dangerously close to ending his life after years of what he perceives to be deep existential malaise. It doesn’t take long for the two men to encounter one another, and after the initial shock, they decide to pair up to accomplish what seems to be an impossible mission. On the surface, Father’s Day sounds like a very strong film – a great pair of leads directed by someone responsible for helming some of the greatest comedies of the 20th century, and driven by an extremely relatable story. Yet, the film falters in ways that are sometimes difficult to pinpoint, and eventually becomes quite limited, even when it has nothing but good intentions and the willingness to entertain the audience to the best of its abilities.

The themes that Reitman chooses as the focus for Father’s Day are present right from the start, in the sense that the title indicates what he is determined to explore. There has certainly never been any shortage of works designed to examine the relationship between parents and their children, and the subject of paternity is particularly interesting, specifically as a response to the influx of conservative discourse that spoke about a “return” to the principles of the older generation. There was a renewed sense of discourse around this issue, the idea that the nuclear family was the ideal, and that the only truly principled way to view any domestic unit was under the Norman Rockwell-esque image of a father and mother with two dimpled children and a dog behind a beautifully-maintained suburban fence. This was obviously not something that Reitman found particularly resonant, which is why the story of two men being told that they are both prospective fathers of a mischievous young man has so much relevance, since it tackles a common source of conversation without becoming too judgmental in the process. The approach here was to create a film that was essentially a buddy comedy where the two leads are not bound by any professional connection or any truly tangible quality, but rather a more abstract (and frankly more far-fetched) intention, which is where the film extracts a lot of its humour. Whether he intended to be some off-the-wall indictment on the rise of conservative values in the period between the two Bush presidencies, or simply because he saw potential in the material remains to be seen, but it is quite clear that Reitman is intrigued by the prospect of examining fatherhood through such an unconventional lens. Naturally, there are some components that do occasionally feel quite insincere, as if they have only been placed in the film as a means to move the plot along, but it gets where it needs to go, and ultimately proves to be quite successful in the process.

Obviously, it does help that Reitman enlisted two of the greatest comedic minds of their generation to play the two leads. It is undeniable that any reason to watch this film will likely come down to the presence of Billy Crystal and Robin Williams as the two leads – two lifelong friends who had shockingly never collaborated on a film until this point. The film makes exceptional use of their individual talents in a way that is nothing if not genuinely quite effective. Indeed, they’re mostly playing into what they were known to do at this point – Crystal is the slightly frazzled but also quietly hilarious straight man to Williams’ offbeat, eccentric clown, whose undercurrent of sadness is quite uncomfortable to witness in light of the actors’ own struggles behind the scenes. Yet, they’re both wonderful, subscribing wholeheartedly to the belief that sometimes the best approach is simply to do what the viewer expects. They’re dynamite together, playing off each other with such incredible skill and nuance, it was obviously designed to showcase their deep, intrinsic knowledge of how one another worked, the nuances and layers they bring to the performances being absolutely stellar and giving Father’s Day such a unique sense of sincerity that is sometimes missing from the rest of the film, especially when everyone in the supporting cast doesn’t seem willing to put in the same effort as the leads – although if you know you were merely playing second fiddle to two comedic titans as they let loose and played to the rafters, you’d be forgiven for knowing that you’ll never be the focus. Nonetheless, Father’s Day is considerably elevated by the fantastic work being done by the two leads, who are strong enough to compensate for the occasional lapses in sincerity faced by a film that needed additional work to feel as compelling as it clearly was aiming to be at the outset.

However, it goes without saying that there is a reason Father’s Day remains mostly forgotten – or at least exists as more of a curiosity at the best of times, a minor footnote in the careers of the two stars at the worst. Both Crystal and Williams are fantastic, but the film that surrounds them is not nearly as good as their talents deserve. We see throughout the film (which is not technically all that long, but drags on in a way that is truly concerning) that there isn’t much substance behind it – the comedic moments are a lot of fun, but there is a limit to how much humour can actually be used to explore a topic that is actually quite complex, and the constant tendency to circle everything back to the offbeat antics of the two leads does force the film to come across as quite shallow most of the time, losing every bit of intrigue and complexity that would otherwise be the focus in the hands of someone who knew how to find the right balance between emotions. The dramatic moments don’t work precisely because they feel tacked on, simply existing to force us to take certain parts more seriously, rather than being well-constructed or meaningful in their own right. It’s a frustrating experience because there was so much potential to be found throughout this film, but it was all squandered by its tendency to always go for the low-hanging fruit throughout, leading to every opportunity to do something special going almost entirely unrealised, with the focus being too going for broke in terms of off-the-wall comedy more than it was actually honouring the more poetic underlying commentary that did not need to be the constant focus, but at least should have been subjected to slightly more work in terms of capturing the spirit of the material in a sincere, meaningful and ultimately far more effective manner.

Father’s Day is certainly not a complete failure, since it is a relatively successful comedy that delivers what it promises, namely a picaresque story featuring two iconic comedians playing off one another while finding themselves in increasingly precarious, challenging situations, which is a big part of the appeal of this film and the primary reason it works so exceptionally well in those moments when it is at its most bombastic. It’s in the scenes where it tries to be reflective and complex that it falls apart, no doubt a result of Reitman and his team preferring style over substance, focusing more on the spectacle than actually weaving anything compelling into the narrative in the process. It’s a solid film, but one that has quite correctly not earned its place at the altar of comedic classics, despite featuring two of the biggest stars in history at the peak of their fame and popularity. Nonetheless, it is very entertaining when it wants to be, and while we may wish for a more thorough, complex exploration of fatherhood and the challenges that come with it, its understandable that it could not achieve everything, so it is more a matter of praising the merits than underlining the shortcomings, which is something that we find populates the film in a way that is sometimes not all that sincere. For those wanting to see a pairing of Williams and Crystal at the top of their game, Father’s Day is quite effective – for everyone else, its a purely middling affair that does the bare minimum, which may be enough for some, but doesn’t do anything to assuage our concerns that it might simply not be as good of a film as it could have been with slightly more focus and a stronger emotional foundation.