No way are you going to click on this review. No way. So I’ll have to force your hand: this movie is connected to the cheesy ’80s heavy metal horror flick Rock ‘n’ Roll Nightmare. Now if that doesn’t make you want to read this film review . . . well, I’ll just have to hang up my laptop and open a Esty store and sell handcrafted bracelets and flower baskets, for I have failed as a writer.

Nick Pearson (Tom Everett Scott, That Thing You Do!, An American Werewolf in Paris, Boiler Room) is a snarky author of the New York Times best seller I Hate Kids—a book that denounces parenthood. Before he finalizes his marriage to Sydney (Rachel Boston, TV’s American Dreams, In Plain Sight), a dream girl who shares his “no kids” philosophy, guess who shows up? It’s boy, Nick! Meet Mason: the now teenaged son you never knew you had.

And how did Mason find him?

Well, a flamboyant radio psychic, The Amazing Fabular (yep, it’s Tituss Burgess, the Unstoppables Laundry Freshener pitchman who was in Dolemite Is My Name with Eddie Murphy), tipped off Mason. And, with that, the lothario, the geek, and the shrill psychic hit the road for a weekend road trip to visit all of Nick’s ex-girlfriends and discover which one is Mason’s mother. Helping along in this effective, Judd Aptow-ish bawdy comedy are the familiar TV faces of Rhea Seehorn from AMC’s hit series Better Call Saul and Julie Ann Emery, also of Better Call Saul, as well as Preacher.

And this is where the heavy metal horror cheese oozes in.

Frank Dietz, the star of the ’80s heavy metal horror flick trifecta of Rock ‘n’ Roll Nightmare, Zombie Nightmare, and Black Roses wrote this. Yep, after his well-liked but all too brief acting career, Dietz forged a career behind the camera as an animator (Jack Black’s Kung Fu Panda is one his many credits) and as a screenwriter.

This, his second feature film writing credit, Dietz made his screenwriting debut with 1996’s Naked Souls—starring Pamela Anderson and David Warner. Now wrap your head around that for a second: esteemed British actor David Warner—Chancellor Gorkon from Star Trek: The Undiscovered Country—in a film with Motley Crue’s Tommy Lee’s ex-wife. But Warner’s been in everything, From Beyond the Grave to Ice Cream Man to Planet of the Apes 2001, so anything is possible in the B&S About Movies universe of stars.

Director John Asher is an actor and director who’s also done everything as well, from directing a post-stoke Kirk Douglas (Saturn 3) in Diamonds (1999), comedy specials for comedians Margaret Cho and Frankie May, videos for the Canadian pop-punk band Sum 41, and acting in episodes of TV’s Blue Bloods, CSI: Crime Scene Investigations, NCIS, and The Rookie.

So what do you have to lose? Come on, now! Frank Dietz from Zombie Nightmare wrote this! That rocks me to my celluloid core. I’m all in.

I Hate Kids recently made its free 2020 streaming bow—with limited commercials—on TubiTv.

About the Author: You can read the music and film reviews of R.D Francis on Medium and learn more about his work on Facebook. He also writes for B&S About Movies.

Disclaimer: This movie wasn’t sent to us by its production company or PR department. We discovered it all on our own—courtesy of its Frank Dietz connection—and we genuinely enjoyed the film.