Dumb and Dumber To

Going into this movie, I knew it could have gone one of two ways. It could have been surprisingly funny, just like the original was two decades ago, or it could of been disappointing. And it did end up being disappointing, not because it was unfunny, but more because we didn't get anything new. One thing is for certain, it says it all in the title.

Harry Dunne (Jeff Daniels) and Lloyd Christmas (Jim Carrey) are reunited after twenty years of Lloyd pretending to be in a catatonic state, just to make a joke at Harry's expense. Harry finds out that he fathered a child with Fraida Felcher (Kathleen Turner) and that she put the baby girl up for adoption. After Lloyd sees the photo of her and falls in love, he decides to help Harry find his now grown up daughter, who is now named Penny Pinchelow (Rachel Melvin).

All in all this movie is almost a carbon copy of the original film. Harry and Lloyd are traveling across the country to find a girl and along the way they foil the plot of another couple (this time played by Rob Riggle and Laurie Holden), who are trying to get rich of someone they are close to. All the jokes in this one are just playing to fans of the original, Billy in 4c (the blind kid with the parrot) makes a return and is even played by the same actor. There is a henchman being extremely annoyed by them in a car until he dies and even the dog van makes a return. I felt like there needed to be newer jokes for a new audience, but apparently the Farrelly Brothers disagree. Sure, there was an obvious Breaking Bad reference, but the joke was extremely laboured and would have done well as a throwaway line.

It is amazing to have watched the careers of Jeff Daniels and Jim Carrey steer in totally different directions. Daniels is now regarded as a fine dramatic actor, whilst Carrey is still trying to hold onto his past as wacky comedic actor. That said, Carrey still possesses his amazing ability as a physical comedian and still throws himself around just as much as he did as a younger man. Daniels slips back into the role of Harry with such ease, that it's hard to believe that he won an Emmy for Best Dramatic Actor just prior to making this film.

All the other actors in this film gave pretty poor performances. Kathleen Turner was a hero in the 80s and 90s with her quick wit, but here she just felt lethargic. Rachel Melvin needs a bit more acting experience before tackling roles like this, because I couldn't help feeling that she is an idiot just like her character. Laurie Holden has never been an actor who has captured me with any of her roles and I know that Rob Riggle can do better than he did here.

Verdict: This movie payed too much service to fans of the original and didn't pave the way for anything fun or new for younger audiences to watch and have something of their own, especially if they were too young to have seen the first Dumb and Dumber.

Movie 43

Please don't watch this movie. Don't see it at the cinema, don't buy the DVD, don't even download it, it's not worth the bandwidth. My friend who was with me at the time, walked out twenty minutes in and I would've have well if I didn't have to review it. I feel as though my IQ has halved. And I wanted to give this movie a chance.

Now I've got that out of my system, let me tell you about it. The plot begins with a filmmaker (Dennis Quaid) pitching a movie to a studio exec (Greg Kinnear). Okay, of to a good start, no problem there, that is until we get to the first short about Kate Winslet going on a blind date with Hugh Jackman. In a regular movie that would be a great set up for a romantic comedy until it all goes south when we find out that Hugh Jackman has balls hanging from his chin, fully grown male testicles. What am I ten, who would find this funny. It obviously doesn't appeal to Greg Kinnear's character either because he immediately wants to put an end to the meeting.

But still Dennis Quaid goes on with his pitch, with stories ranging from an extremely dirty mouthed Emma Stone (who is going to have to work extremely hard to regain my love) sucking on Kieran Culkin's (Macaulay's brother) finger to a sketch about a product called iBabe (a naked female that functions like an iPod) made by a company headed by Richard Gere. Other sketches include Liev Schreiber and Naomi Watts telling their new neighbours about the disgusting ways that homeschool their son (some of which are borderline incestuous). I am sure their son will grow up to be a mass murderer. Another short involved young Chloe Grace-Moretz getting her first period, with all the men in the house freaking out.

One storyline I did like (I use that term insanely loosely) was called Gotham City Speed Dating. In this short, Robin (Justin Long) is at a speed dating night, only to be humiliated by Batman (Jason Sudeikis), who shows up because a bomb has been planted at the venue by the Penguin. Kristen Bell is Supergirl and Uma Thurman is Lois Lane. Superman is portrayed as some kind of perverted sex fiend. The only reason I "liked"this segment is because Jason Sudeikis played Batman similar to his character Schmitty from It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia and that's only because his character in that is a dick.

As the film progresses, we find out that Dennis Quaid isn't some big director, but instead some crazy guy who has wandered in of the street with the hopes of getting his film made. But then in an insane twist, at the end we find out that the camera that was filming this was just a behind the scenes camera all along.

I don't know what the makers of this film were thinking, the same thing with the actors. Was Peter Farrelly trying to make some bold statement about the future of film? I don't think so. Were the actors, keep in mind that these are Oscar and Golden Globe worthy actors, just doing this movie as a bit of fun? Maybe, we'll never know. Two particularly offensive performances come from Stephen Merchant (Ricky Gervais best mate) who ends up with plastic surgery that has turned him Asian a la Mickey Rooney in Breakfast at Tiffany's and Terrance Howard (as in Terrance Howard from Crash, a Best Picture winner) plays a coach of an all black basketball team in 1959, who convinces his team that they can win purely because they are black. Come on, that's more racist than the whole of Django Unchained.

Verdict: It's unfunny, racist, disgusting and just plain horrible. Avoid at all costs. Go see any other movie.