The Family Plan 4K 2023 2160p WEB

A former top assassin living incognito as a suburban dad must take his unsuspecting family on the run when his past catches up to him.

The Family Plan 4K Review
“The Family Plan” (not to be confused with the recent “Family Switch”) is being marketed as a comedy for, well, family audiences, with promotion emphasizing acts of bonding and cute baby reactions to entice viewers. The actual feature isn’t actually built for children, with director Simon Cellan Jones and screenwriter David Coggeshall (“The Haunting in Connecticut 2: Ghosts of Georgia”) offering a coarse action comedy following the survival instincts of an ex-assassin trying to protect his loved ones from a team of killers looking to eliminate him. There’s nothing gentle in the picture, and it’s mostly a painful sit, with Coggeshall presenting random acts of violence without much of a story to provide dramatic investment, and Jones (a television vet) supplies generic stunt sequences, hoping blasts of brutality might distract from dismal comedic interactions, which this endeavor is chock full of.

Living in Buffalo, New York, Dan (Mark Wahlberg) is a high-end car dealer making a life for his family, including wife Jessica (Michelle Monaghan), and kids Nina (Zoe Colletti), Kyle (Van Crosby), and baby Max. Growing concerned about distance in his household, Dan tries to stay in touch with his family, but trouble comes for the mystery man when he’s targeted for assassination by teams of professional killers, forcing him to come up with a plan to get his clan out of Buffalo. Creating a vacation story to cover questions, Dan quickly plans a road trip to Las Vegas, working to lose those on the hunt for him, on his way to meet contact Augie (Said Taghmaoui), collecting fake documents for a new life. Along the way, Dan and Jessica rekindle their spark, becoming a couple once again, and they’re exposed to Nina and Kyle’s true selves, with the former eager to stop at an Iowa college to decide her future, and the latter’s identity as a top gamer is revealed.

Life is good for Dan, who’s introduced as an expert in sales, able to put anyone into a car they can’t afford. He’s the top employee, but doesn’t want to be photographed, preferring to enjoy the fruits of his labor with his family, though they aren’t the tight-knit unit they once were. “The Family Plan” offers moments with the dysfunctional crew, as Nina is obsessed with her long-distance boyfriend in Iowa, preparing to drop her interest in journalism to be with him after she graduates high school. And Kyle maintains a secret life as a popular gamer (known as “Kyllboi”), paying a classmate for garage rental to maintain his dominance. Jessica is also deflated, feeling the pressures of parenthood, finding a pal in Gwen (Maggie Q) to help work through her issues. There’s hope for happiness in a date night trip to the amusement park where Jessica and Dan originally met, but tenderness caught by a cell phone triggers trouble for the father of three, who first encounters a threat at a supermarket, openly taking down an assassin with Max strapped to his chest.

“The Family Plan” transforms into a road movie, with a panicky Dan trying to collect his loved ones and take them across the country to Las Vegas, unwilling to explain the danger coming for them. It’s a weirdly cruel premise for a comedy, but the writing spends the opening hour exploring it, following Dan’s efforts to keep the mission quiet while eliminating threats, including the arrival of motorcycle assassins the dad gets rid of while his family sleeps. Jones aims for Michael Bay-style action to spice up “The Family Plan,” and Coggeshall offers a more episodic journey for the characters, with stops on the trip introducing new problems. During the journey, Nina gets a better understanding of her choices, Kyle leans into his fame, and Jessica feels the rush of youth, proving herself by executing a keg stand during a campus tour. There’s also a laser tag battle between father and son, because why not?

Coggeshall is definitely lifting from “True Lies” for “The Family Plan,” using the second half of the tale to explore Jessica’s response to the news that her mild-mannered husband is a government agent. The story lands in Las Vegas and stays there, looking to define menace from villain McCaffrey (a dull Ciaran Hinds) and secure family bonding to keep up a sense of warmth for a feature that doesn’t earn any emotion. And there’s the big question as to why camera-phobic Dan would even want to meet in Las Vegas, one of the most monitored cities in America. The whole thing drags on for nearly two hours, never landing a joke or an exciting confrontation, and the production makes a strange call to keep this seemingly benign effort a hard PG-13, with sex, violence, and cursing common during the bloated run time, potentially launching some wildly uncomfortable family movie nights. There are probably better ways to spend quality time with relatives, and much better films to pick from, with “The Family Plan” a seriously misguided endeavor.