Little Fockers: a running joke too far?

As enjoyable as Meet the Parents was, the film did lack one tiny thing – the word "Focker" in the title. Thankfully that's been rectified with 2004's Meet the Fockers and the forthcoming Little Fockers, before the series reaches its natural conclusion in 2014 with a shockingly graphic and quickly banned pet-based sequel called Animal Fockers. The trailer for Little Fockers was released last week, raising all sorts of questions. Will it be able to improve on Meet the Parents? Will Robert De Niro continue to do his once-funny CIA finger-point? Will any of the characters manage to have a funnier name than Gaylord Focker – perhaps Homosexual Shytty-Puddle or Disabled Foreigner? Who knows? Let's pick through the Little Fockers trailer to see what we can find … 1. After some rudimentary scene-setting - essentially a) Robert De Niro telephones Ben Stiller, b) shouts "I'm hilariously uptight … and I'm coming to your house!" and c) Ben Stiller makes a sad noise on a trumpet – we meet the eponymous Little Fockers. In the first real shock of the trailer, it turns out that they aren't even that little. 2. Ah, the dinner scene. All Focker films need one, whether it involves the desecration of a dead woman's ashes or a child's foreskin being cooked in a fondue. And this time, it's a carving accident where everyone ends up being soaked in arterial blood. Robert De Niro has won two Oscars. 3. Incidentally, the answer to the question "Will Robert De Niro continue to do his once-funny CIA finger-point" is yes. Yes, Robert De Niro will continue to do his once-funny CIA finger-point. Is it any funnier? No. No, it isn't any funnier. 4. But when Ben Stiller does the CIA finger-point back at Robert De Niro? Boy oh boy, that's comedy gold right there! To some extent. 5. And now to the improbable casting choices section of the Little Fockers trailer. As you can see, this instalment stars Jessica Alba, fresh from showing off her comedy chops in that film about the man who graphically attacks the prostitute and, equally depressingly, Good Luck Chuck. 6. Next, Laura Dern. That's not such a weird choice. She might be primarily known for her strange, otherworldly work with David Lynch, but remember that she was also in Jurassic Park. Like Robert De Niro, Dern can play both comedy and drama. She's a versatile actor and she'll do well here. 7. Harvey Keitel, though? Different matter. He can only play variations on his Bad Lieutenant character, which explains the scene in Little Fockers where he suffers a harrowing, guilt-induced breakdown in a church. Hilarious. 8. And, of course, there's Barbra Streisand. 9. Now for the trailer's big joke. Jessica Alba's character wants Ben Stiller's character to represent a barely-disguised version of Viagra. Let's try to guess the pay-off. 10. Did you guess "Ben Stiller stabs Robert De Niro's erect penis with a syringe in front of a screaming, visibly traumatised five-year-old boy"? No? Better luck next time, then. Why didn't Dustin Hoffman want to star in this, incidentally?