With the new Netflix release – Me Time, Kevin Hart seems to be trying to revive himself. It feels like an attempt to take himself seriously by those who didn’t allow him to be a host of a particular event in the past few years. The film is primarily a bromance comedy with annoying Mark Wahlberg, who has made a career out of playing annoying man-child characters. Written and directed by John Hamburg, this buddy comedy film is a series of gags that often rely on outdated styles of humor. While I share a review of why it doesn’t work a little later, let’s see what happens during its one-and-a-half hour of runtime.
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Me Time (2022) Netflix Summary & Synopsis
The film begins with a scene where Kevin Hart (Sonny Fisher) and Mark Wahlberg (Huck) characters are near the edge of a cliff, about to jump down the depths. While Sonny is scared to go along with it, unfortunately, he falls, and Huck jumps right after trying to save him. After this cliche showcase of friendship, the film cuts to the present time, where we are introduced to Sonny – a househusband whose wife – Maya (played by Regina Hall)- is their family’s bread earner. While his role is generally seen in a bad light, he seems to enjoy it – from taking care of the kids to doing the household chores.
Even while meeting with other parents, Sonny keeps professing his love for being a stay-at-home dad. Other parents, from Jill (Naomi Ekperigin) to Alan (Andrew Santano), criticize his lifestyle while saying how much more he can accomplish. But he keeps mentioning how rewarding it is while showing his kinship to a housewife dropping off her kid at school. He even arranges school plays as a PTA president from his kids’ school. At an event for Maya’s office, her colleague – Armando (played by Luis Gerardo Méndez), whom Sonny considers him flirting with her. He gets jealous, thinking they are having an affair.
During their conversation, he keeps sharing details about their kids that she has no clue about. Later at home, when he mentions it, she tells him how he’s overreacting to it. Knowing how being constantly with the kids leaves no time for him to be on his own, she suggests he take some time off while she takes care of the kids. While he is reluctant to spend his free time with a bunch of 20-year-olds, he decides to spend some quality ‘me time’ with his old friend, Huck. He goes on an adventure trip and even succeeds in winning a fight over a wild animal. While many unpredictable things on this adventure do not go along with his present personality, he aces most of them and receives their praise and affection as a primal man.
Later, Stan Berman (Jimmy O. Yang) comes to their campsite, to whom Huck apparently owes a significant amount. Sonny tries to negotiate a deal with Huck, but Stan doesn’t listen to his plea and goes on to burn his camp. As a result, they have no other option but to return to their homes. After this fiasco, both have a heart-to-heart discussion about their lives – where Huck confesses that he didn’t leave his ad agency job but was fired. While Sonny admits that he leads a boring life, Huck envies how great his life is with a beautiful family. On their way back home, they decide to go to Armando’s house to damage it in any way he can – since he made Sonny emasculated by being with his wife during his departure.Â
After being done with this revenge plan, they return to Sonny’s house, where he is surprised to see several people gathered for a party. Over there, he finds his parent friend snorting the powder of some ADHD medication for his kid. Everyone he finds to be having great fun, just like this friend. While bewildered by this and not used to it as someone comfortable with his life as a stay-at-home parent, he gets to showcase his talent of singing with a popular musician who arrives at their party. When Maya returns home with their kids, she finds out not just about the crazy party but the crazy amount he has spent on arranging it, after which she leaves in anger. Later, he finds Huck purposefully destroyed his car just because he knows he can get a new replacement.
Me Time (2022) Netflix Review
A buddy comedy film that is unfunny for the most part
I would be lying if I said I didn’t enjoy Me Time in bits and pieces. The kind of humor Kevin Hart has worked on for decades to build a brand is bound to have some impact. His singular bewildered expression is found for most of the film’s runtime, which attempts to show him as someone happy to take a traditionally non-masculine role. As a stay-at-home dad, he can be seen as averse to anything that he used to like and being mature about his life choices. It includes not being ashamed of being a househusband, not being interested in ‘manly’ adventure, and being content in taking care of kids.
A lot of it seems terrible, like every idea that the makers thought could appease today’s progressive audience. They show Kevin’s character opening by speaking with a gay, transgender, non-binary person, most of which he seems to have made fun of in his comedy routines. He is shown to be sensitive, or at least not averse to them. He is shown as someone who learns from his mistake and acknowledges them. He feels no dishonor in being a support to his bread-earner wife. He seems comfortable living his life doing the house chores and does not ask for any reward for this. Even his mother conveys envy about their couple based on how Regina’s character gets to live her dreams, unlike her.
All of this is shabbily packed in the film’s script, which still finds most of its comical punches making fun of his status of being a stay-at-home dad. It also seems to have a hangover from The Hangover trilogy, where it seems to borrow a lot of its raunchy humor inspiration. There is only so much you can take from these stale formulas of comedy. Despite the good performances, there is very little redeeming about a film that tries to redeem itself while deriving much of its humor (and its ‘fun element’) from the gags it aims to critique. The manchild to mature adult arc of Wahlberg’s character is perhaps the most annoying trope that the film tries to capitalize on.Â
Me Time (2022) Netflix Ending Explained
Do Sonny and Huck become friends again?
The morning after the chaotic party, Sonny calls Maya to apologize while mentioning how he is not the person like all those who came to the party. He even goes to Armando’s home to apologize, who says how he sees Maya as just his best friend and how Sonny need not worry about him. At school, he can’t be his regular peppy and optimistic self because of being caught up in worries about the previous night. At the talent showcase event at the school, he gives his son – Dashiell Fisher (Che Tafari), a chance to play music as the closing act. He fails at it on the stage, and when Sonny comes on stage to help him, Dashiell mentions how he doesn’t like playing the keyboard in the first place – and how he would instead do stand-up.
After this, Sonny gives a spur-of-the-moment, inorganic emotional speech about being a stay-at-home dad. Afterward, Dashiell amuses the audience with his stand-up performance. In the end, Sonny and Maya rejoice after apologizing to one another. Later, Sonny visits his friend Huck once again to advise him not to follow the fantasy of being the most eligible bachelor like George Clooney and be mature about his life choices. Instead of m having to work for Stan to pay back the money, they decide to start their production and rise on the waves of fame and popularity in no time.Â
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