Christmas in small town Ohio is the backdrop to “Nutcrackers”, yet another ‘fish out of water’ feel-good story, this time from director David Gordon Green. Following some lukewarm swings at franchise horror with three Halloween movies and one Exorcist sequel, Green attempts to lighten things up with “Nutcrackers”. Unfortunately he ends up with pretty mixed results.

Ben Stiller takes on his first lead role in seven years playing Michael, a development manager at a prominent real estate firm in Chicago. We meet him as he’s on his way to Ohio to take care of some family business. We learn that his sister and her husband were tragically killed in a car accident leaving behind their four young sons. As the only living relative, Michael has to sign papers before the children can be placed with their new foster family.

Michael’s plans are for a quick trip as he’s due back in Chicago for an important sales pitch for his firm. But his plans derail after he arrives and is greeted by Gretchen Rice (Linda Cardellini) with the Department of Family Services. She informs him that the potential foster family backed out and he must assume custody until another family can be found. Clearly unequipped and unprepared, city boy Michael finds himself out of his element on his late sister’s farm with four rambunctious kids to wrangle.

A huge chunk of the movie is spent on Michael’s culture clash with his four nephews, Justice, Junior, Samuel, and Simon (played by real-life brothers, 12-year-old Homer, 10-year-old Ulysses, and 8-year-old twins Arlo and Atlas Janson). It’s the centerpiece of what is a cliché-riddled story that’s full of cheap humor and country-fried rural stereotypes. Amid the stream of fart jokes, farm animal cracks, and one painful and neverending sex-ed gag, Green and screenwriter Leland Douglas try to develop something resembling an emotional center but it never feels authentic.

To Stiller’s credit, he does bring a little warmth, and he manages to make Michael’s eventual internal conflict somewhat believable. But he’s trapped within a terribly predictable character arc that hits every single beat you expect. Absolutely nothing will surprise you about what his character does and where he ends up. And while Cardellini is every bit as good as she always is, she’s given very little to do which seems like such a waste.

By the final act, Green shelves the attempts at comedy and goes for the tear ducts with a sentimental finish that might have tugged at our heartstrings if not for the lackluster hour that preceded it. You can sense what the movie is shooting for and you can imagine ways that it might have worked. But the lack of originality, the overreliance on a tired formula, and the uninspired humor keeps the movie from ever earning our investment.

VERDICT – 2 STARS