BEFORE: Another movie that it seems has been seen by everyone in the world, except for me. Hey, I've been busy in the last 16 years...plus I suppose I avoided this film as long as I could. Why? Because it's dumb, it says so right in the title.
It's no coincidence that my Jim Carrey chain overlaps with my mental illness chain - playing various morons and idiots was his stock in trade for years.
THE PLOT: The cross-country adventures of two good-hearted but incredibly stupid friends.
AFTER: Yeah, it's pretty dumb. There are one or two slightly redeeming jokes... ("Pull over!" "No, it's a cardigan!") but the movie lost me with the toilet humor. I don't find people accidentally drinking urine, or ingesting industrial-strength laxatives, to be laugh-worthy humor. It's pandering to the basest level of human existence, making light of bodily functions...entertainment on a third-grade level.
Maybe it's better to watch this one with a group of like-minded people, I don't know. I just found that most of the jokes didn't land for me. And the stupid parts, even though intentionally stupid, were just stupid...and not even "stoopid".
Starring Jim Carrey (last seen in "The Mask"), Jeff Daniels (last seen in "Good Night, and Good Luck"), Lauren Holly (last seen in "Turbulence"), Charles Rocket (last seen in "Delirious"), and character actor Mike Starr (last seen in "Blue Steel"), with cameos from Teri Garr (last seen in "Michael"), Karen Duffy, Harland Williams, NHL legend Cam Neely, and Nibbles, the New England Pest Control termite mascot.
RATING: 3 out of 10 beer bottles
"Dumb and Dumber" is a good demonstration of the cable TV ecosystem. There's no way in hell that this trailer could have motivated me to block out a few hours from my life, drive to the theater, plunk down ten bucks, and then spend two hours in "Dumb And Dumber"'s world without the benefit of a magazine or an iPhone to keep me entertained during the slow bits. But if it's on cable when I happen to have sat down on the sofa with my lunch? Sure, bring it on.
ReplyDeleteI actually liked it. "Airplane" taught us all that you can make a movie out of 100 minutes of really silly jokes, if it's being acted and shot by people who know how to make this stuff work. Plus, it's a good comic pairing.
I agree 100% about the crap and pee jokes. It's real "junior college sketch-comedy club" stuff. Have these jokes _ever_ worked for me? The only one even close to this kind of comedy that I laughed at was the pool scene in "Caddyshack." Maybe because the joke was completely situational. It wasn't just "Hneh hneh hneh hneh...it's funny because it's poop. Hneh hneh hneh!"
Did you know that in the World of the Movies, urine and feces have no detectable odor or flavor? True.
Hmmm...not exactly true. In this very film, a highway cop sips from what he thinks is a bottle of beer, but is actually pee (which doesn't really make sense - a cop would probably smell the bottle to confirm alcohol, but NOT take a sip). The cop is then staggered by the taste of urine in his mouth - but since the writers didn't have a punch line, he was essentially just paralyzed while Mr. Dumb and Mr. Dumber drove off.
ReplyDeleteAlso, later in the film, when Mr. Dumber is on the toilet, after ingesting laxatives - he tries to open the window and fan the smell out. So clearly there was a smell, even though we movie-watchers were blissfully spared.
I'll also add "Airplane" as a rare case where jokes about bodily functions really worked for me. They found a way to make barf gags and poop jokes land - but they were also surrounded by a large number of more cerebral jokes.
I'm referring to EV-ery gross-out comedy in which someone "accidentally" ingests something toilet-related.
ReplyDelete"What's this in the fridge? Hey! What luck! A few ounces of apple juice would really hit the spot right now. What a convenient little clear plastic unlabeled container, too! Mmmm! Refreshing!"