Paul Blart: Mall Cop - Blu-ray Review at DVDfile.com

I have to admit upfront I have a big, bear-hugging soft spot for Kevin James. The comedic actor has a certain innocent charm and genuine likeability that reminds me of great comedic talents like John Candy, John Belushi and Chris Farley. His antics never seem to be mean-spirited or vulgar and he’s never reluctant to let himself become the brunt of the joke — often jumping (quite literally) into self-deprecating routines with broad physical humor and slapstick bits. As the star of the long-running and underrated The King of Queens, he demonstrated he could easily carry a weekly sitcom, but his fledgling film career to date has been less impressive. He’s typically been relegated to either playing second banana to people like Will Smith (Hitch) and Adam Sandler (I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry) or doing bit parts in other movies. Now, through the courtesy of Sandler’s Happy Madison imprimatur, he’s gotten his first starring vehicle in Paul Blart: Mall Cop, a movie which he also co-wrote with Nick Bakay (The Dennis Miller Show). In keeping with his own standup style, Paul Blart: Mall Cop is decidedly inoffensive and family-friendly; a harmless diversion that doesn’t pretend to be anything more.

On the down side, the film is anchored to an intriguing if somewhat familiar premise (with whiffs of the recent Seth Rogen vehicle Observe and Report) that sort of misses a lot of great opportunities for even bigger laughs. It seems as if James and everyone else in the movie was trying a bit too hard to play it safe and keep the movie just this side of the PG-13 rating in order to guarantee a wider audience. As a result, the end product lacks the cutting edge and wit to make it as memorable as something like last year’s Forgetting Sarah Marshall or even Role Models. Paul Blart: Mall Cop plays like … well, a light and breezy TV sitcom. Not that that’s necessarily a bad thing — it’s just at this stage in his career, Kevin James deserves better and should be aspiring to something more. As it stands now the movie could have simply been renamed Doug Heffernan: Mall Cop and I don’t think too many people would have noticed the absence of Carrie and her basement-dwelling father, Arthur, or that Doug had somehow traded in his brown IPS uniform for rent-a-cop duds.

With dreams of becoming a New Jersey State Trooper, the affable Paul Blart (Kevin James) has a few personal obstacles standing in the way — he’s overweight, out-of-shape and hypoglycemic. So when he tries, yet again, to qualify for the coveted position, he can’t even complete the basic training without passing out due to low blood sugar. But life goes on as Blart returns to the comfort of home where he lives with his enabling mother (Shirley Knight) and doting daughter Maya (Raini Rodriguez). Although he’s disappointed about losing out on the state trooper gig, he’s content to return to his longtime position as security guard at the West Orange Pavilion Mall. Dressed in full uniform and riding a mall-issued Segway personal transportation device, he proudly motorvates to work where he takes his job seriously. Sadly, no one else thinks maintaining the safety of transient shoppers is as important as Blart, a ten-year veteran of the job. His fellow security guards are just there to get a paycheck and they wish he’d do the same. As the busy Christmas season approaches, a new kiosk worker named Amy (Jayma Mays) catches Blart’s eye, and he makes a bumbling attempt to ask her out. Shy and self-conscious about his weight, Blart is obviously smitten with Amy and she takes an initial liking to him.

During a gathering of mall employees one night, Blart mistakenly downs a pitcher of Margaritas after attempting to win a nacho-eating contest, which sets him on an unexpected drinking binge that results in an embarrassing encounter with Amy. When they see each other again at work on Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving that is typically the busiest shopping day of the Christmas season, Amy is noticeably aloof. Blart fears he may have scared her off for good … but he’ll soon get a chance to prove his mettle. As the mall prepares to close after the busy day, several employees rush to cash their checks at the bank and Blart offers to look after the game arcade while his buddy joins them. It’s at this point that a band of thieves who had been posing as “Santa’s Helpers” working at the holiday display clear out the remaining shoppers and take over the mall. Amy is trapped inside the bank and taken hostage along with other employees as the gang hatches its plan to steal all the credit card codes from the lucrative shopping day. What’s worse is the ringleader turns out to be a guy named Veck Sims (Keir O’Donnell), who was just hired as a security guard trainee working alongside Blart. Sims has planned this scheme from the get-go, only he wasn’t expecting the gun-shy and weaponless Blart to pose much of a threat.

Sims has assembled a gang of fearless extreme sports types who zip around the mall using bikes, skateboards or a skill known as “free running” — jumping around, through and under things — to collect the coveted credit card information from all of the mall stores. They systematically collect the data while Sims holds the mall employees hostage inside the bank to keep the cops outside at bay. But the one wild card here is Blart, who also gets trapped inside with them and then passes up a chance to escape when he realizes that Amy is one of the hostages. In an obvious nod to Die Hard, Blart becomes the experienced security guard on the inside, using his cell phone to communicate with the other guards and police outside about the gang and their intentions. Frustrated that Blart is attempting to foil his plan, Sims sends his minions to track the security guard down and remove him from the equation — but Blart’s commitment to his duty and his affection for Amy drive him to fight back against all odds. When Blart’s daughter inadvertently gets added to the hostage pool, Blart goes on a First Blood rampage, systematically taking out Sims’ cohorts, one by one. In the end, Blart has to prove to himself, his daughter and to Amy that he can overcome his own obstacles and finally succeed.

With obvious swipes from several action films, Paul Blart: Mall Cop is far from original. But it’s a well-meaning premise that’s family-friendly and, for the most part, credible. The idea of using the extreme sports fanatics seemed a bit trite and pointless at first, but they offer an amusing contrast to Blart’s seemingly incompetent and ineffective security measures — to wit, buzzing around on a Segway issuing “speeding tickets” to elderly men in motorized wheelchairs. Blart is all heart, and as played by Kevin James he’s both sympathetic and appealing. He makes you want to root for him to win, even if you can see the pat ending coming a mile away. The supporting cast here also does fine work, especially Jayma Mays as Blart’s doe-eyed love interest; Raini Rodriguez as Blart’s devoted daughter; and Keir O’Donnell (Wedding Crashers) as Blart’s greedy nemesis. But even at a scant 91 minutes, the movie feels padded and strains for laughs. What could have been a full-blown shopping spree ended up feeling like a nominal gift certificate.

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