Cheaper by the Dozen
Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation | Release Date: December 25, 2003 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
46
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 30 Critic Reviews
Positive:
6
Mixed:
18
Negative:
6
Watch Now
Stream On
Stream On
Stream On
Buy on
Stream On
Stream On
Stream On
Stream On
Expand

Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
75
Baltimore SunChris Kaltenbach
Equal parts fantasy and cautionary tale, a film that manages to be uplifting and off-putting simultaneously -- fortunately, more the former than the latter. Read full review
75
PremiereSara Brady
Cheaper entertains a broad audience by recalling an age of family filmmaking when that term wasn’t synonymous with crap. Read full review
75
Entertainment WeeklyLisa Schwarzbaum
Martin and Hunt are exactly the right lively but not sticky authority figures to keep the house (and the comedy pace) bouncing. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
Lighthearted fun. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleRuthe Stein
It's not just a feel-good holiday movie, though audiences, especially youngsters, will certainly walk out of it feeling good. Read full review
63
Chicago TribuneRobert K. Elder
Isn't without charm, or laughs. Director Shawn Levy's film features some of the best child actor casting since "The Little Rascals." Read full review
60
Wall Street JournalJoe Morgenstern
Something of a shambles -- a shambles about a shambles -- but bound for big success and deservedly so.
60
Village VoiceEd Park
Solidifying his funnyman rep, Ashton Kutcher appears as oldest child Piper Perabo's model-actor boyfriend, a delightfully brainless narcissist. Read full review
60
Chicago ReaderHank Sartin
Be forewarned: this comedy bears only the faintest resemblance to the classic book and film of the same name. Read full review
50
Philadelphia InquirerCarrie Rickey
Much as I adore Martin and Hunt, whose matching tongue-in-cheek delivery and finite patience make them seem more like siblings than spouses, their movie is indistinguishable from an Afterschool Special. Read full review
50
Washington PostAnn Hornaday
An unobjectionable if uninspired updating of a classic family story for the minivan generation. Read full review
50
Washington PostDesson Thomson
This is a movie that knows its audience and realizes it doesn't need much of a story to hit that audience, literally, where it lives. Read full review
50
Boston GlobeWesley Morris
Martin puts a thankless gloss on the antic role he played in "Parenthood." As his wife, Hunt is the movie's saving grace. Read full review
50
Christian Science MonitorDavid Sterritt
Soft, sentimental, and as unlike real family life as you can get. Read full review
50
Miami HeraldChristine Dolen
If only director Shawn Levy and the screenwriters had gone for cute and interesting instead of dull and cloyingly sentimental. Read full review
50
The A.V. ClubKeith Phipps
Much of the film feels like watching "Home Alone" and "Mr. Mom" on 12 different TVs at once. Read full review
50
The Hollywood ReporterMichael Rechtshaffen
Thanks to Martin and Hunt, who both have a seemingly casual flair for mining laughs from even the most generic lines of dialogue, Cheaper by the Dozen works better than it might have in less capable hands, but even they're challenged by some of the picture's forced mood swings. Read full review
50
Los Angeles TimesKevin Thomas
As synthetic as a plastic Christmas tree. Read full review
50
USA TodayClaudia Puig
Makes one long for Martin's edgy work in films such as "The Spanish Prisoner." Read full review
42
Seattle Post-IntelligencerSean Axmaker
Resembles nothing more than an overstuffed, undernourished "Brady Bunch" episode, only not as funny. Read full review
40
EmpireNiall MacPherson
The film works best when it taps into the chaos generated by the kids, and there are a number of suitably anarchic Home Alone-style set-pieces. Read full review
40
VarietyRobert Koehler
Unfortunately knows no tone between schmaltzy/gooey and slapstick/gross-out. Pic is as far from the original pic and its autobiographical memoir source as it can be while retaining the same title. Read full review
40
TV Guide MagazineAngel Cohn
Generally amusing -- if occasionally overly sentimental. Read full review
40
L.A. WeeklyJon Strickland
Nobody here, especially Martin, looks as if he's having much fun, apart from a dizzy cameo by Ashton Kutcher as oldest daughter Piper Perabo's model-actor beau, riffing heavy-handedly on his pretty-boy image, and loving it. Read full review
38
New York Daily NewsJack Mathews
There is not a frame of "Cheaper" that doesn't feel contrived. It fails the most fundamental test of movie logic. Read full review
38
New York PostMegan Lehmann
Can be summed up by the fact that Ashton Kutcher, making a glorified cameo as a narcissistic model-slash-actor, is the best thing in it. Read full review
30
Dallas ObserverRobert Wilonsky
Nothing happens. At all. Ever. Remember when Steve Martin was funny? Apparently, neither does he. Read full review
30
The New York TimesStephen Holden
A bubbling crockpot of farcical mush to warm the tummies of anyone who really and truly misses "The Brady Bunch," and I mean really and truly. Read full review
30
Austin ChronicleMarjorie Baumgarten
Everyone learns a lesson by movie’s end: Don’t put work before family. Curiously, no one learns that all this could have been avoided with a good method of birth control. Read full review
25
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Rick Groen
The same studio has aimed a remake at the same family market. Translation: The once-modest piece has been redesigned as a vehicle (a lumbering SUV) for Steve Martin, stripped of any vestigial charm, and then thrown into neutral, where its manic engine does nothing but roar loudly and pointlessly for the duration. Read full review
More From This Movie

46 Critic Reviews

7.0 User Reviews

Details & Credits|Trailers

Current Movie Releases
By MetascoreBy User Score
1 81 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple
2 77 Project Hail Mary
3 75 Send Help
4 73 Hoppers
5 72 The Sheep Detectives
SEE ALL
Essential Links
New on Amazon Prime Video
New on Netflix
Coming Soon to DVD/Blu-ray
SEE ALL