Baby Mama - B

In theaters. Rated PG-13, 99 minutes. Trailer.

I wish Tina Fey was one of my close friends. I share her neuroses, irreverence, and failure to assimilate into normal social situations. In her second film role (Mean Girls was the first), she absolutely nails the role of a single careerwoman in her late 30's that gets the baby itch. After she is told she has a 1 in a million chance of getting pregnant, she enlists a surrogacy company to help her scratch her matronly itch. Enter Amy Poehler as the white trash surrogate, in an expansion of her one legged SNL character Amber. Click below for more on the chick flick I actually liked.

The story is very predictable, with lots of fish out of water and white trash/uptight yuppie bits as well as baby showers and redemption of all of the characters. Tina tries to get Amy to take better care of the baby in her belly, but Amy is concealing a secret that will hurt Tina too much to tell her. Though not written by Fey (that honor goes to Mike McCullers), the script has her fingerprints all over it, and her delivery of the smarmy lines is as spot on as it is on 30 Rock. Greg Kinnear, Sigourney Weaver, Steve Martin and Romany Malco all turn in funny and inventive supporting performances that keep the movie from veering too far down chick flick lane.

McCullers does a good job of keeping the film out of the hokey genre, except a 14 minute sequence near the end of the film with a baby shower, really dumb courtroom scene, and baby delivery sequence. My favorite sequence was the girls night out and Fey's actions in the club. A good movie with lots of laughs.