Keeping Up With the Steins A Movie Review	MPAA Rated - PG-13 It's 1:39 Long A Review by The Dude on the Right

"Keeping Up With the Steins" gives us Benjamin Fiedler (Daryl Sabara from "Spy Kids" fame). His buddy, Zachary Stein (Carter Jenkins), was recently Bar Mitzvahed, and his dad, Arnie (Larry Miller), held a most extravagant party, a Titanic theme complete with icebergs and mermaids. Well, as dads are want to do, especially in the competitive world that is Hollywood, Benjamin’s dad, Adam (Jeremy Piven), has to do everything in his power to have Benjamin’s Bar Mitzvah out-bar-mitzvah that of Zachary’s. As easy enough that story was set to be, let’s add that Adam and his dad, Irwin (Garry Marshall), are on the skids since Irwin ran out on the family years ago, and Adam never forgave him.

Now, as things are exploding out of control in terms of Bar Mitzvah planning for Benjamin (his has turned into a baseball theme, to be held at Dodger stadium), Benjamin wants to figure out a way for dad to get distracted as the big day comes near. So our boy Ben decides to send Irwin an invite to the party, but changes the date so grandpa shows up a couple weeks early. So we’ve got Adam trying to outdo Arnie, Adam and Irwin fighting each other, and Benjamin just trying to figure out, really, what this Bar Mitzvah thing is all about.

Well you can guess most of the endings of this film, namely that Benjamin figures out what growing up is about, that Benjamin will actually bond with grandpa, and that yes, dad and grandpa will patch things up. But there are some great surprises at the end of this movie, summarized simply by my favorite line from the film, "Holy shit!"

Weird, but before writing this review I wanted to get a general feel of what other reviewers thought of the movie. So I headed to some other movie review sites, read the review of the dude in the "Chicago Tribune," and decided that these people are nuts because the general consensus is really mixed, and a lot of them outright not liking this film. Look, "Keeping Up With the Steins" is not a gut-busting, tear-jerking, family story, but a fun, entertaining look at how trying to outdo can spin things out of control. In this case it’s outdoing a Bar Mitzvah party, but it happens everyday, everywhere, from everything from christenings to "Sweet Sixteen" parties, from Bar Mitzvah parties to graduation parties. For this movie, happily, Benjamin has the best idea for his Bar Mitzvah, much to the chagrin of Arnie, Zachary’s dad, who really can’t believe it.

I don’t care what anyone says, I really enjoyed this film. There are tons of jokes, Garry Marshall is probably in one of his best roles lately, and I’ve always been a fan of Jeremy Piven, and for this movie, he does not disappoint me. Doris Roberts is also great as Rose, Irwin’s wife who still hasn’t divorced him after all of these years, and I found Jami Gertz as Benjamin’s mom, Joanne, in full MILF mode.

Screw the other reviewers, I loved this movie and am giving it 4 ½ stars out of 5. Hopefully word of mouth with get this film to open wider, but if it doesn’t end up at a gigaplex near you, be sure to get the DVD when it comes out.

That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!