The celebrity-packed New Year’s Eve, out today, suggests that Hollywood learned almost nothing from the disappointments of kitchen-sink ensemble Valentine’s Day (or really any movie that attempts to re-create Love Actually without famous British actors). “Stuff as many famous people into a movie as possible, then see what happens”: still a viable moviemaking strategy! In What to Except When You’re Expecting, this governing theory is applied to the subject of babies, meaning: Fake bumps! Breast-feeding jokes! “Dude’s Group”! (This last bit, which involves all the Baby Bjorn–ed dads strutting onto the playground to “Big Poppa,” did actually elicit a chuckle. So did the kid falling down.) Your baby-crazy celebrity roster on this one includes Cameron Diaz, Jennifer Lopez, Chris Rock, Elizabeth Banks, Dennis Quaid, Brooklyn Decker, Rob Huebel, Thomas Lennon, plus adorable movie couple Anna Kendrick and Chace Crawford (do they actually have a baby? Is she the accidental pregnancy plotline? Discuss). Two stray but related thoughts: (1) Kudos to Joe Manganiello for sticking to his no-shirt look on a playground in a movie about babies and (2) we’re glad to see Jennifer Lopez paired up with the second-hottest dude in the movie. Onscreen, as in life, J.Lo. Keep repeating that.
