Review: Despite a Bogged-Down Script, ‘Delivery Man’ Has Enough to Make it Work

Taking an interesting turn, Vince Vaughn’s usual acting mania is toned down in Director Ken Scott’s “Delivery Man,” less a comedy and more an interpersonal drama than might be expected from Vaughn. The film, which starts strong but unfortunately wanders quite a bit during its second act, is quite a departure from Vaughn’s usual sarcastic repertoire in films such as “Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story” and last year’s “The Internship.” With solid casting and a unique story, it’s a shame that “Delivery Man” loses itself about halfway through the film even if it does finish well. Good acting and heart saves the film from complete disaster; however, confusing jumps and turns take away from what could have been an infinitely better film. 

Vaughn plays David Wozniak, an incompetent but caring deliveryman for the family meat business. His father (Andrzej Blumenfield) and brothers are the favored, with David taking twice as long to do deliveries and having a semi-disastrous personal life. David’s life takes a turn for the worse as David learns that his current girlfriend, Emma (“How I Met Your Mother’s” Cobie Smulders) is pregnant, and collection agents are hot on his tail for $80K he owes. However, a bigger bombshell is dropped on him: David, who made over 600 donations to a sperm bank, learns he is the biological father of 533 children, who, grown up, now want to know who their birth father is.

A remake of Ken Scott’s French-Canadian film “Starbuck,” “Delivery Man” is a seemingly earnest filmmaking attempt that has a couple of base strengths even if it has more weaknesses. For instance, David is an honestly likeable guy, even if he is a complete screw-up, and it isn’t hard to root for him. For his part, Vaughn does a good job filling his shoes, leaving out a lot of the screaming and hijinks that made some of his previous efforts humorous yet stilted. There is no crassitude a la “Old School” here, nor any of the over-the-top behaviors that made his pairings with Owen Wilson in “Wedding Crashers” and “The Internship” so successful. On his own for most of the movie, Vaughn brings an inherent charm and heart to Wozniak where a weaker direction could have brought little more than a slapstick throw-a-way.

Cobie Smulders and Vince Vaughn in “Delivery Man” (Dreamworks Pictures, 2013).

Additional characters bring warmth to the film as well, such as Chris Pratt who plays Wozniak’s family man and lawyer friend, coming off the heals of the recent “Her,” who gets more of a role here even if it is stultified and one-sided. Additionally, as Emma, Cobie Smulders, who has been seemingly constrained in previous films such as “The Avengers” or “Captain America: The Winter Soldier,” gets to branch out, and her chemistry with Vaughn is a surprising delight of the film. Finally, Wozniak’s father, Andrzej Blumenfield, adds heart to the film in the right places. Absent for most of “Delivery Man’s” run-time, a heart-to-heart he has with David as the movie reaches its closing adds a forgiveness to the film’s jerky path as well as bad decisions David makes throughout his life.

Where “Delivery Man” suffers, regrettably, is in the handling of its main plot, that of David coming to terms with being the father of 533 children, and whether or not he should take responsibility for this uncanny deed. “What would a normal person do in this situation?” David asks. “A normal person would not be in this situation,” his father morosely responds. And while the film offers some genuine sweetness early on (such as David assisting one of his children who is suffering from drug addition), the film shifts gears, as David gets lost in the throes of fighting a lawsuit by his children to announce his identity. This is also worsened by the semi-wasteful use of Chris Pratt as David’s lawyer, when a slightly smarter script would have used Pratt’s inclusion as an way to help David change rather than encourage the opposite.

Regrettably, the film uses this lawsuit as a way to waste the sweetness brought to earlier parts of the film and as a way to procrastinate David’s ultimate desire to be a father to his children. Early scenes, such as a bond that David forms with one of his children (Adam Chanler-Berat) when he discovers “Starbuck’s” identity, are sweet and effective; however, a frivolous and unnecessary counter-lawsuit to protect his identity takes audiences away from some of the film’s more rewarding early scenes. By the time the film does come around, it feels overlong and detracts from the sweetness the film could have brought – frustrating, as Vaughn actually does a good job garnering authentic emotion for his character.

At the end of the day, “Delivery Man” is not a bad film, just one bogged down with some bad script decisions and unnecessary elements that unfortunately subtract from the overall effort. The acting in the film is decent, and it has its funny scenes, as well as its genuine ones. It’s nice to see Vaughn in a role that doesn’t rest on his comic laurels, and the film’s ending, featuring “Little Hands,” a catchy and sweet song by Inland Sky, offers audiences an acceptable closing after wading through some wandering and pacing issues. While not likely to be as entertaining as some of Vaughn’s earlier efforts such as “Swingers,” you could find a number of worse ways to spend a 105 minutes at the movies than “Delivery Man.”