Sure, Josh Duhamel is cute. And Katherine Heigl is cute. And babies are generally cute. But that doesn’t mean any of these people can act, or that a movie with them all in it isn’t going to royally suck and resemble pretty much everything we’ve ever seen based on gender stereotypes. Yay!

If you like good movies, you probably won’t like Life As We Know It. Heigl plays her constant, expected role of the neurotic, Type-A control freak (this time, she bakes!) and Duhamel plays the confirmed bachelor all of the girls (and the gay guys) on the block want to spend some “quality time” with, though everyone pretty much ignores Heigl’s beauty (perhaps this was an attempt as reversing sexism?). The two are thrown together after their married best friends die in a car accident, leaving their one-year-old baby orphaned.

It could be a complex, interesting scenario if the characters weren’t such boring, one-dimensional stereotypes. They are thrown together on a blind date at the beginning of the movie that fails because Duhamel is late, dressed crappily, wants to take her on a motorcycle ride, forgets to make dinner reservations, and makes a booty call right while she’s sitting there with him. It wasn’t even remotely funny or interesting; you’re already sighing, looking at your watch.

There are scenes in which a baby is completely put in danger (but hey, it’s a comedy!), where it’s apparently acceptable to parade a bunch of strange women in front of said baby, and where baby gets to know not one but two surrogate daddies before her own has even been in the ground for a year. Hooray for stability!

Both of them sort of make sacrifices for the baby, which is good because babies aren’t accessories that just fit into your life like a new watch. However, it still seems way too easy on them, and they only run into a single schedule glitch (during which the baby is entrusted to a cab driver, of all people, to babysit her) during the whole movie. Yeah, that’s not realistic, but neither is much of the rest of the film.

Oh, and Katherine Heigl apparently cannot feel poop when it hits her face. Seriously? I don’t know any parents who’ve not been able to feel a glop that big hit their faces. Maybe a wild spray, sure, during sickness and diarrhea, but that would’ve been way too gross for Heigl’s face, amirite? (Why was Duhamel spared of this beauty mark, I wonder?)

Something that really bothered me was that the death of their friends seemed to be taken rather lightly. It’s a comedy, and that sort of thing just can’t hang in the air like that over them. That poor kid is going to grow up without her real parents, and you really can’t get that out of your mind while you watch it, either.

It’s meant to be a rom-com, but it pretty much fails at both. I don’t know what I’d classify this movie as other than plain old boring. Skip renting it and see Crazy, Stupid Love in theaters instead; you’ll be glad you did.