PLAYDATE (AMAZON PRIME) (2025)

SYNOPSIS: An afternoon playdate between two stay-at-home dads (Kevin James and Alan Ritchson) turns into high-stakes chaos. 

MOVIE REVIEW:

This buddy action comedy pairs Alan Ritchson (Reacher) with Kevin James (Mall Cop) for the first time and, well, makes for a decent yet forgettable streaming movie for the month of November.

Brian (James) was a forensic accountant before he got fired. So his wife, Emily (Sarah Chalke), suggests he take a break and spend some quality time with his stepson, Lucas (Benjamin Pajak), who much prefers dancing to lacrosse. One day at the park, Brian gets to know another father-and-son duo, Jeff (Ritchson) and CJ (Banks Pierce). However, their supposedly harmless playdate soon turns into a series of chaotic events. There are apparently bad guys after Jeff, and Brian and Lucas are unwillingly dragged into the whole fiasco.

We shall be brutally honest about Playdate. There are movies made for streaming that deserve the big-screen experience and there are those that deserve to be watched on your television or handphone. Playdate certainly belongs to the latter category.

There is a decently silly twist to why the bad guys are after Jeff or CJ, but often the narrative is just plain silly. Just when you think Kevin James is back as yet another Mall Cop or Zookeeper character, he is somewhat overshadowed by Ritchson, who surprisingly steals the spotlight as the zany, comedic Jeff. No worries here, Ritchson still does what he does best, meaning he continues to beat the crap out of everyone that stands in his way. That said, the action sequences look passable and cheap, including some rough physical choreography and subpar visual effects.

Surprisingly, there are a number of notable faces here like Stephen Root and Paul Walter Hauser, with Alan Tudyk playing an evil tech mogul. Even Isla Fisher appears in no fewer than three scenes as a “mama mafia,” whatever that means.

There is also a whole laundry list of minivan jokes and references to famous movies, proving that Playdate struggles even to fill its less-than-90-minute runtime. This sort of mismatched buddy comedy has been done to death, and this one certainly isn’t going to give us much hope. At least Ritchson is doing great in a role that probably belongs to John Cena if he’s not too busy making other crap.

MOVIE RATING:

Review by Linus Tee