Surprised no one has brought this one up. But I guess you need to be the parent of a 5-9th grader to be up on this.
The books themselves are humorous (although I’m 51, I could still relate to many of Greg’s midadventures). The first movie last year was okay, kind of finding its legs. This new movie was much better; many more humorous scenes, better pacing. The Sunday afternoon crowd that my son and I attended were really into this film. And as a surprise it beat Sucker Punch at the box office.
If you have a kid (especially a boy) in that age range, it’s worth a trip to the movies.
Yeah, gotta take my daughter to this. She has all the books, reads them constantly, and is dying to see this movie (she has the first on DVD). Like the OP, I found some of the situations Greg gets himself into to be… familiar.
My kids love the books and I took them to both movies on their opening weekends. The books are really funny even to adults, and the movies are really good and well cast adaptations which give the fans of the books everything they want.
The second movie is definitely funnier than the first one, and I think it’s basically a perfect rendering of the characters, gags, tone and attitude of the books.
Part of what I like about the books is that the title character is kind of a jerk. He’s not necessarily always sympathetic. He’s often a dick to his little friend, Rowley, he’s got an inflated ego, he’s sometimes oblivious to the feelings of others, etc. There aren’t always consequences either, and he doesn’t necessarily learn any lessons. That makes him more realistic and relatable, not to mention funny.
Even if you don’t have kids, the books are worth picking up. They don’t read like kids’ books, they’re just these satirical little comic book hybrids with a lot of subtle humor that’s aimed over kids’ heads and right at adults.
I believe the first book wasn’t even initially intended to be a kids’ book, but the publishing company decided to market it that way. That first book, in particular, does not read like a kids’ book.
ETA my daughter told me her school had to make a “no cheese touch” rule a few months ago after a school wide outbreak started threatening the order of the school.
I remember seeing an interview with author Jeff Kinney when the first movie came out. He had over 3,000 pages of the diary when he approached publishers about getting them published. He was turned down flat because he insisted that they be published exactly as he wrote them–handwriting and pictures intact. No publisher would agree to sucha project from an unknown author.
So Kinney went to the new invention called “The Internet” and put them up. When they got over a million hits the first month, he had publishers literally knocking on his door to get him to sign a contract.
I love stories like that. And the books are so entertaining!
I actually stumbled across the original website for DOAWK and started reading them (think the website was fun brain or some such). Anyways, I emailed the author, Jeff Kinney from my office and he responded with a very nice email and even asked me for some examples of what I liked and didn’t like (my email signature makes it quite clear that I am an adult so he didn’t think I was a kid). Naturally I ignored it.
Nice to see him do well as he seems like a decent chap.
I took mudgirl to see this yesterday. She’s been a fan of the books for a couple of years now, and it’s one of the book series we like reading together; I’ll read some, then she’ll read some.
I thought the movie was well done. I love how the parents are so clueless! Sometimes this really happens in a kids’ life.
Is it just me, or is the Mom in the movie a total Sarah Palin lookalike?
BTW, the silver-haired guy who plays Holly Hills’ father in the movie is author Jeff Kinney.