GROWN UPS
Frivolous fun, but these fathers don’t always know best.
Should You Watch It?
Grown Ups is a pleasant, lighthearted comedy built around five old friends, their marriages, and their children. Its story affirms marital faithfulness, honesty, parental authority, family responsibility, and the value of spending time together. It also encourages outdoor play and traditional games instead of violent video games.
The movie earns its three-star rating through warmth and enjoyable comic performances, but its humor is frequently lowbrow and off-color. Sexual innuendo, partial nudity, crude jokes, foul language, alcohol use, and a scene of drunkenness make it unsuitable for children and young teens.
If you are an adult who can exercise discernment about that material, the movie offers some worthwhile lessons beneath its frivolity. For family viewing with children, choose something else.
The Story
NO SPOILERS — WE KEEP THE SURPRISESFive childhood friends reunite at the funeral of their middle school basketball coach, 30 years after they played together. With their families in tow, they gather at a lakeside cabin and former funhouse for a Fourth of July weekend.
As they reminisce, enjoy the outdoors, and revisit old rivalries, the friends discover things about one another—and themselves—that they never knew. Their children also learn that simple family time can be more rewarding than life behind screens.
Is It Any Good?
Three stars means this is an enjoyable but frivolous comedy rather than a substantial film. The five lead comedians bring the kind of humorous commentary and comic talent associated with their stand-up performances.
The plot is lacking, the characters are poorly drawn, and many scenes mainly provide opportunities for jokes about aging, children, and marriage. Still, the film contains plenty of heart. Its strongest material comes when the characters recognize the damage caused by privilege, dishonesty, busyness, and a lack of discipline—and begin to value family time, sincerity, and faithful friendship.
The Worldview
The film’s moral center stresses marital faithfulness, honesty, parental authority, and responsibility. Its married characters seek to renew their relationships with their wives and children, while their friendships help them confront personal weaknesses. The movie also presents outdoor play and traditional pastimes as healthy, enjoyable alternatives to violent video games.
Several characters learn that wealth, appearance, career, and possessions do not determine the worth of a father or husband. One character acknowledges that marriage brings daunting obstacles but that those obstacles are not impossible to overcome. Another apologizes after being dishonest. These are sound moral lessons, though the film often presents foolish and immoral behavior as comedy.
The movie includes a cross displayed in a chapel and a serious rendition of “Ave Maria,” but it makes no other mention of God, Jesus, church, or the afterlife. Its moral outlook is therefore more family-centered than explicitly Christian.
The film’s emphasis on faithful friendship and family responsibility connects with Scripture’s call to “encourage one another and build one another up” (1 Thessalonians 5:11).
The Content Guide
The specifics — spoilers included by nature — so you can judge for your own family.
Content Summary
Strong moral worldview overall stresses marital faithfulness, honesty, and parental authority and responsibility, as main characters seek to invigorate their friendships with one another as well as rejuvenate their relationships with their wives and children, the only single character leads a pagan lifestyle that directly opposes that of his married comrades, but his immoral behavior is treated as buffoonery and his antics are not encouraged by the other characters who are hopeful he will one day “grow up,” plus some minor, light Christian content in a Cross displayed in a chapel and one character gives an overly dramatic but serious rendition of “Ave Maria” that causes other characters to laugh; 12 obscenities and no profanities, plus jokes about a grandmother passing gas; some violence and slapstick violence includes violence and bloodshed on video game children are playing but children’s father discourages them and urges them to play Chutes and Ladders instead, arrow pierces one character’s foot, another character swinging from a rope overhanging a lake hits a tree before falling to the ground, and a man moronically zip-lines into a metal building; sexual promiscuity is alluded to as a unmarried character sits on the edge of a bed talking on the phone as a woman sleeps beside him covered by a sheet, one man’s wife is much older and he shamelessly kisses her, unmarried man flirts with married friend’s daughters but makes it clear he is not serious, and some verbal allusions to sex, including some comic ones to one May-December married couple’s sex life; rear male nudity after man (who’s hung over) wakes up and partial rear male and female nudity at a water park, plus some upper male nudity and some skimpily dressed young women are ogled by main characters and, at other times, by their pre-teen sons; light alcohol use and one display of drunkenness; no smoking; and, main character lies consistently throughout movie, but he is confronted about this and genuinely apologizes, and several scenes and comical references of a mother breastfeeding her 4-year-old son, but her breast is covered.
Talk About It
Questions for the drive home, the dinner table, or the youth group.
The friends learn that family time matters more than screens and luxury. What simple activities help your family enjoy one another?
Deuteronomy 6:6–7 · Psalm 127:3One character lies about his work and later apologizes. Why does honesty matter even when the truth feels embarrassing?
Ephesians 4:25 · Proverbs 12:22The married couples must make time for affection and responsibility. What can help a marriage remain faithful and attentive during a busy season?
Hebrews 13:4 · 1 Corinthians 13:4–7The movie treats some foolish behavior as comedy, even when people are injured. How can you tell the difference between something funny and something wise to imitate?
Proverbs 14:16 · 1 Corinthians 6:12The Final Word
Grown Ups is enjoyable, warmhearted, and morally better than its crude humor suggests. But its content is not for children or young teens. Adults who can exercise discernment may find the trip worthwhile; families seeking clean viewing should choose something else. WORTH THE TRIP — ADULTS ONLY.
