The House is marginally better than his last two movies but only because it's too meek and forgettable to be as hateable as his dual 2015 comedies all about gay panic jokes and toxic masculinity. Here, the name of the game seems to be to weirdly echo Neighbors by having Will Ferrell and Amy Poehler play Scott and Kate, respectively, who are parents that want to send their daughter Alex (Ryan Simpkins) to college. Unfortunately, they've got no money to speak of and a pompous city council member, Bob Schaeffer (Nick Kroll), has screwed them out of getting a scholarship. All seems lost.
But then their gambling addict buddy Frank (Jason Mantzoukas) gets a plan to get them some real money...run an underground casino and gather up all the money they need to send Alex away to her dream college in only a month's time. It starts out small enough but it soon grows into a larger enterprise complete with an outdoor pool area and fight club that also soon leads to both Scott and Kate becoming more violent mobster-like individuals (Kate develops a love for flamethrowers and other fire-oriented objects) while their underground casino also manages to gain the suspicions of one Bob Schaeffer.
A bad comedy isn't exactly a surprising creation but good Lord, it is thoroughly shocking just how limp The House is from top to bottom. The screenplay penned by Brendan O'Brien and Andrew Jay Cohen (the latter of whom also handles directorial duties here) totally comes off as one of those comedic screenplays some studio bought because the basic premise sounded promising, then they roped in two big stars and hoped an improv-laden approach to the story could carry the day. Alas, that's not what happens as a cavalcade of talents actors (including Cedric Yarbough, the man who had a memorable guest spot on Crazy Ex-Girlfriend and an even more memorable turn on BoJack Horseman as Officer Meow Meow Fuzzyface) get thoroughly wasted in a plot line that just never finds anything funny to do.
How is it possible to turn both Will Ferrell and Amy Poehler into dull humorless personalities in what's supposed to be a comedy? The House manages to accomplish such an awful task by handing them characters who aren't just thinly-realized, there's no personality in the main married couple's rapport with each other or in other characters in the film. In terms of their performances, Will Ferrell always looks like he's about a few seconds away from nodding off while Amy Poehler doesn't get much to do in the plot proper in terms of being a part of pivotal plot points or in just getting to do funny stuff. They're just such lazily realized characters, both in terms of writing and performances, it'd likely come off as insulting if the whole thing wasn't so forgettable.
Maybe the best way to sum up how desperate for laughs The House is that at one point it just shoehorns in an obviously ADR'd fart noise to follow up a character delivering the also obviously ADR'd line "At least I still have my dignity" for a laugh. That's the best they can do with the excellent cast they have at their disposal. All of those dismal gags plus we get some incredibly boring directing from director Andrew Jay Cohen, who shows no real sense of visual distinctiveness in his work here, and we all get to see Allison Tolman get thoroughly wasted in a supporting role. Is this the best we can do by way of Allison Tolman?? Cmon Hollywood! Give her an excellent drama to headline, Fargo proved she more than deserves it! Heck, we all deserve better than the insanely unfunny The House.
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