I really liked Robert DeNiro’s second directorial effort, The Good Shepherd*, a movie that was smart, classy and old-fashioned. So from now on I am going to try and keep that movie in mind every time there’s new announcements of DeNiro being cast in yet another loud, stupid comedy.
This time he’s coming back for a third Focker movie, Little Fockers, in which I assume Ben Stiller has knocked up Teri Polo at least twice. Maybe they have twins for twice the ‘hilarity.’ One can poo on Stiller while the other pees in his face! Anyway, Universal has renewed their deal with DeNiro’s Tribeca Productions for another two years, which paves the way for a second sequel that will reunite not just the cast of the first film but also Dustin Hoffman and Barbara Streisand from the second. In fact, it looks like everyone’s coming back, except hopefully for the dead sister. That would be unpleasant at best.
Why a third film? Quite simply because the first two made 800 million dollars worldwide. And I am hoping that DeNiro is thinking that if he plays a little ball here he can make some money and make Universal happy enough to greenlight his much-discussed sequel to The Good Shepherd, despite the fact that the original didn’t set the box office aflame.
*He did not direct The Score, despite what IMDB says.