JUDY MOODY AND THE NOT BUMMER SUMMER – The Review

A cute kids movie that is sure not to bummer their summer!

Judy Moody is on a quest for the perfect summer. To ensure that she and her friends have the best time ever, she invokes “thrill points” for every cool thing that they do. The only problem is two of her friends are leaving for the summer. Rocky is going to circus camp, and Amy is on a quest to Borneo. That leaves her with Frank, a less than cool kid with a streak of bad luck, and her brother Stink, who is on a quest to find Bigfoot. To make matters worse, her summer trip is cancelled and Judy has to stay at home with her Aunt Opal, who she barely knows. Now Judy is in a race with her friends to see who can have the most “not bummer summer”!

Jordana Beatty is fun as the character of Judy Moody. She might have played a moody role, but she got to also bring some fun to the character. Heck, if she can sit through a scene where she has to let someone vomit on her while riding a roller coaster, Beatty should be up to 1,000,000 thrill points! Heather Graham was perfect as the role of Aunt Opal. She really nailed the eccentric, fun parts while maintaining a respectably wacky adult persona. Her character was very likeable! Preston Bailey, who plays Frank, is absolutely adorable. You may recognize him from his role as Cody, Rita’s son on Dexter. And, come on… who wouldn’t want Jaleel White as their teacher. Although White’s character, Mr. Todd, is dressed a bit like his famous Steve Urkel character, his personality is not. White plays a fun, creative teacher who seems to really capture the kids attention, and imagination!

The film itself was fun. It has to be taken for what it is… a children’s movie. It had me laughing throughout. There were a couple of parts that were a little slow, but it was still enjoyable to watch. I mean, who doesn’t want to follow on quest for Bigfoot?

The only thing I can honestly say that I did not like were the characters of Judy and Stink’s parents. They seemed to be more catoonish and fake. Sure, the whole film has a bit of a cartoonish, silly tone to it, but the parents, especially the mother (Janet Varney) were just over-the-top! The mothers wardrobe didn’t even slightly match anyone else and she stuck out like a sore thumb (and her character was not suppose to). It was distracting, and just annoying, My least favorite parts of the film were all scenes where the Moody parents were involved.

If you are looking for a fun summer movie to take the family to, the kids will love this!

Overall Rating: 3 out of 5