Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules (film)

Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	David Bowers
Screenplay by	Jeff Judah Gabe Sachs
Based on	Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules by Jeff Kinney
Produced by	Nina Jacobson Brad Simpson
Starring	Zachary Gordon Devon Bostick Rachael Harris Robert Capron Steve Zahn
Cinematography	Jack N. Green
Edited by	Troy Takaki
Music by	Edward Shearmur
Production companies	Fox 2000 Pictures[1] Color Force[2] RatPac-Dune Entertainment[2]
Distributed by	20th Century Fox[2]
Release date	March 17, 2011 (2011-03-17) (Singapore) March 25, 2011 (2011-03-25) (United States)
Running time	100 minutes [3]
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$21 million[3]
Box office	$72.4 million[4]

Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules is a 2011 American live-action/animated comedy film^[5] directed by David Bowers and based on Jeff Kinney's 2008 book of the same name. It stars Zachary Gordon and Devon Bostick. Robert Capron, Rachael Harris, Steve Zahn, and Peyton List also have prominent roles.

The film was released on March 25, 2011, by 20th Century Fox. It earned $72.4 million on a $21 million budget. It is the second installment in the Diary of a Wimpy Kid film series, preceded by 2010's Diary of a Wimpy Kid. A sequel followed in 2012, Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days.

Plot[]

The Heffley family attends a back-to-school roller skating party, where Greg, now about to start seventh grade, reunites with Rowley Jefferson and meets a new girl named Holly Hills, whom he instantly develops a crush on. His older brother, Rodrick, interferes with the party by sabotaging his attempt to ask Holly to skate with him and tricking their parents, Susan and Frank, into embarrassing him by talking to him on the rink's PA system and carrying him off the rink. Greg tries to tackle Rodrick for humiliating him, but ends up face-planting in a girl's birthday cake, causing her and her friends to beat him up.

The next day, a local talent show is advertised on TV, and Rodrick sees it as his band's big break. Greg and Rowley try to become famous themselves by making videos for YouTube in the hopes of going viral. Susan, who writes a parenting column in the local paper, wants to get Greg and Rodrick to spend more time together and incentivizes them with money. However, at church the following Sunday, Greg and Rodrick get into a scuffle over a chocolate stain on the back of the former’s pants which the latter caused, leading them to be grounded from a family trip to a water park the following weekend. During that time, Rodrick throws a wild party which Greg and Rowley end up participating in. However, the next morning, their parents unexpectedly announce they will be returning early from their trip, prompting the brothers to hastily clean up the house. They find that someone wrote "Rodrick Rules" on the bathroom door in permanent marker. Greg gets the idea to replace it with a door in the basement, though after the rest of their family gets home, they realize that the replacement door does not have a lock.

Rodrick tells Greg to deny everything, but Susan soon realizes the lock is gone and confronts Greg over it. Greg confesses that he and Rodrick had people over, but lies that it was only a band practice and begs Susan to let it go so that Rodrick will continue to spend time with him. Susan agrees to this, and Rodrick, believing that Greg had done what he asked, gains respect for his younger brother. The two start spending more time together, and Rodrick gives Greg advice on school and girls, though most of it gets Greg in trouble. At school, Greg and Rowley joke about Chirag Gupta being invisible. However, Chirag later gets revenge by forging a note from Holly asking Greg to meet in the art room. Greg approaches what appears to be Holly, only to be met with a disguised Chirag; the other students in the art room then laugh at him. After this incident, Greg does pass Holly in the hallway, but she mistakes him for Fregley.

Susan and Frank end up finding pictures of Rodrick's party, causing a fight to break out among the Heffleys in front of Susan's editors at the paper. Greg and Rodrick are grounded, with Rodrick being prohibited from playing in the talent show. Having learned that Greg partially admitted the truth to Susan earlier, Rodrick states that they may be brothers, but will never be friends. Greg and Rodrick are punished further by being forced to spend the weekend at their grandfather's retirement home, but Greg does end up running into Holly there. Holly apologizes for her earlier mistake, and the two become friends. Greg writes about this in his diary, but the next morning Rodrick gets his hands on it and runs out to show it to Holly. Greg chases after Rodrick in his underwear and manages to get the diary back, but ends up running into the women's restroom where he is violently chased out by some old women. Rodrick records the security camera footage of this incident and holds it over Greg.

At the talent show the next week, Rodrick finds out that he has been booted from his band by Bill Walter, a guitarist who recently joined; and Rowley is not able to perform his magic tricks due to his assistant, Scotty Douglas, having stage fright. Greg decides to participate in Rowley's magic act; his doing so persuades Susan to let Rodrick perform with his band. The magic act is praised by the crowd, including Holly, but people are unimpressed by Rodrick's band act until Susan starts dancing at the edge of the stage, and the crowd begins to join in Susan's dancing. Frank tapes the entire footage of Susan dancing, agreeing with Greg to keep it a secret. Rodrick boots Bill from the band and gives Greg the tape from the retirement home as a token of forgiveness in return for making it possible for him to perform. The brothers reconcile as Rodrick drops Greg off at school the following Monday.

In a mid-credits scene, Greg and Rowley upload the "Dancing Mom" video on YouTube, and a lot of viewers like the video, making Greg and Rowley an Internet sensation. However, Rodrick finds out about the video, continuing Greg and Rodrick's rivalry.

Cast[]

• Zachary Gordon as Gregory "Greg" Heffley, the middle son of Susan and Frank and the brother of Rodrick and Manny
• Devon Bostick as Rodrick Heffley, Greg and Manny's older brother and Susan and Frank’s oldest son who is a drummer and a bully
• Connor and Owen Fielding as Manny Heffley, Rodrick and Greg's younger brother and Susan and Frank’s youngest son who never gets into trouble
• Robert Capron as Rowley Jefferson, Greg's childish best friend
• Rachael Harris as Susan Heffley, Rodrick, Greg, and Manny's mother
• Peyton List as Holly Hills, Greg's love interest
• Steve Zahn as Frank Heffley, Rodrick, Greg, and Manny's father
• Fran Kranz as Bill Walter, a brief new member of Rodrick's band whom Frank dislikes
• Grayson Russell as Fregley, Greg's weird classmate
• Karan Brar as Chirag Gupta, a friend of Greg's
• Laine MacNeil as Patty Farrell, Greg's arch-enemy since kindergarten
• John Shaw as Mr. Draybick, Greg's history teacher who used to have Rodrick as a student
• Bryce Hodgson as Ben, one of Rodrick's friends
• Terence Kelly as Grandpa Heffley, Frank's father and Rodrick, Greg, and Manny's grandfather
• Belita Moreno as Mrs. Norton, a music teacher at Greg's school
• Andrew McNee as Coach Malone, Greg's gym teacher
• Alf Humphreys as Mr. Jefferson, Rowley's father who dislikes Greg
• Jakob Davies as Scotty Douglas, Rowley's former assistant who was replaced by Greg due to stage fright
• Teryl Rothery as Mrs. Kohan
• Serge Houde as Mr. Salz
• Melissa Roxburgh as Rachel Lewis, one of the girls at Rodrick's house party
• Dalila Bela as Taylor Pringle, a rude and unforgiving girl who celebrated her birthday at the roller rink at the beginning of the film
• Jeff Kinney, the series' author, makes a cameo as Jonathan Hills, Holly's father.

Production[]

Brad Simpson stated he anticipated a sequel movie if the first film is a success. "Our writing staff are writing a sequel right now, "Rodrick Rules," which would be based on the second book"..."And, you know, we hope that the people to see a second movie, so that we are in position of going again right away and making another film. I certainly know that the fans would like to see all the books made into movies." Fox 2000 greenlit the sequel and Zachary Gordon returned as Greg Heffley. Steve Zahn (Frank Heffley) and Rachael Harris (Susan Heffley) also returned. The film was directed by David Bowers and the screenplay was written by Gabe Sachs and Jeff Judah. Principal photography began in Vancouver August 2010. A few new characters appeared in the film, including Peyton List as Holly Hills. The trailer was seen with Gulliver's Travels. The website created for the first was updated for the sequel featuring pictures of the cast and a short synopsis of the film. The film was released on March 25, 2011. Talks of a sequel were announced after the release of the first, but was not officially announced until May 12, 2010, announcing that it would be released March 25, 2011.^[6] Filming took place in Vancouver, British Columbia and New Westminster, British Columbia from August 23 to October 27, 2010.^[7] The mall scene was filmed at Park Royal Mall in West Vancouver.^[8] The roller rink scene was filmed at the PNE Agrodome, due to Vancouver lacking a real roller rink. Director Thor Freudenthal was replaced by director David Bowers (director of Flushed Away by Aardman, the creators of Wallace and Gromit, and the film adaptation of anime cybernetic superhero kid Astro Boy).

Distribution[]

The trailer was shown with Gulliver's Travels on December 25, 2010. It was later online on January 3, 2011. A poster was released there after on January 14, 2011. In February 2011, an exclusive online-only trailer was released on the "Wimpy Kid Movie" YouTube channel, officialwimpmovie. Due to the success of the first film in Singapore, the film was released there eight days before the US release on March 17, 2011. The film was released in Brazil on September 16, 2011.^[9] A TV spot of the movie was released in March 2011.

Home media[]

The film was released on a stand-alone DVD, a special edition double DVD pack, and a Blu-ray/DVD/digital copy combo pack on June 21, 2011. One of the bonus shorts was shown during iParty with Victorious on Nickelodeon at 8:00 PM on June 11, 2011.

Reception[]

Box office[]

The film made $7.3 million on its opening day, ranking #2 behind Sucker Punch. It managed to rank #1 in the weekend box office.^[10] In the UK, it debuted at #3 in the weekend box office behind Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides and The Hangover Part II. The film eventually grossed $52,698,535 in the US/Canada and $19,718,859 in other countries for a worldwide total of $72,417,394.

Critical response[]

On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 47% based on 100 reviews and an average rating of 5.4/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Moderately witty and acceptably acted, Diary of a Wimpy Kid 2 isn't much worse than the first installment."^[11] On Metacritic, it has a score of 51 out of 100 based on 23 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".^[12] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave tit an average grade of "A-" on an A+ to F scale and same as Diary of a Wimpy Kid.^[13]

Robert Abele of the Los Angeles Times gave the film a positive review saying, "Director David Bowers keeps things peppy and brightly lighted, but the movie's swiftest pleasures come from moment-seizing cast members." Richard Roeper of the Chicago Sun-Times gave it a positive review saying, "A little less wimpy, gives value lessons to the watchers from the cast, and still pretty funny" and a B rating. Pete Hammond of Boxoffice magazine gave it a mixed review stating "Even better than the first edition, in its own sitcom-ish ways." However, Michael O'Sullivan of The Washington Post gave it a negative review, stating "You can't fault the filmmakers for reshaping a diary into a cohesive film. You can however, fault them for taking one of the great antiheroes in preteen literature and turning him into, well, an even wimpier kid."^[14]

Accolades[]

References[]

External links[]

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• Official website
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules at IMDb
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules at AllMovie
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules at Box Office Mojo
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules at Rotten Tomatoes