Just when you thought Vin Diesel’s horrifying career swan dive could plunge no further, he signs up for this mirthless reworking of Kindergarten Cop.
It‘s true that this once promising thespian was in quite desperate need of some demographic repositioning. We all know that the big, lisping lug dearly loves the action genre but after The Chronicles Of Riddick and A Man Apart, it’s quite clear that it don’t love him back. Still, his bid for escape into PG fluffiness surely didn’t require stooping to such mindless depths as The Pacifier.
In it, Mr. Diesel essays barking Navy Seal Shane Wolfe, a pulsating ball of testosterone reassigned from front line duty to protect five moppets following the death of their scientist father, who may have left some kind of super military thingy secrets in the family home. Mayhem and bonding ensues.
If that wasn’t quite unappetising enough, The Pacifier contrives to play like an inverted version of The Sound Of Music, even working in a stage production of the musical. Bizarre as that sounds, Vin makes for a thoroughly convincing anti-Maria, quickly demonstrating the benefits of a disciplined militaristic life and buffed muscle tone for his five charges.
Watching him – as the film charmingly puts it – get all “shock and awe” around the house; then instructing the children in the noble arts of ass-whooping, The Sound Of Music’s nazi uniforms seem less and less out of place. Is this babysitting or prep for a tour of duty in the Gulf?
Those inclined to laughter at the sight of Vin Diesel covered in shit will certainly find much to enjoy here. For everyone else, I suspect the same image will seem like a tragic metaphor.