Dumb and Dumber To

DUMB AND DUMBER TO (Bobby Farrelly and Peter Farrelly, 2014)

In DUMB AND DUMBER TO Lloyd Christmas (Jim Carrey) has been institutionalized for two decades, although his infirmity has been a extensive practical joke he’s been pulling on his best friend Harry Dunne (Jeff Daniels), who has faithfully visited and changed his diapers every Wednesday. When Harry informs Lloyd that he can’t come any longer because of his own medical condition, the prank is revealed, leaving them to tackle Harry’s issue together.

Harry needs a kidney transplant. Lloyd isn’t keen to give him one of his, but they may have found a solution when they learn Harry is the father of an early twentysomething daughter he never knew he had. The girl’s mother Fraida (Kathleen Turner) gave her up for adoption to a scientist and his wife but does know where she lives. The boys leave Rhode Island to find Penny (Rachel Melvin) only to arrive at her home after she’s departed to make a presentation at a technology conference in El Paso for her ill, Nobel Prize-winning father (Steve Tom). Penny left Dr. Pinchelow’s invention behind, so the two numbskulls are entrusted to deliver it to her as Harry pursues a daughter and donor and Lloyd seeks a bride.

For a film in which a fair amount of the humor involves what goes in and comes out of orifices, DUMB AND DUMBER TO manages to seem inoffensive despite its crudity. The vulgar comedic ingenuity includes a cat’s feathery flatulence and a father’s hilariously inappropriate advice for dealing with menstruation. DUMB AND DUMBER TO serves as a good example of how limitations can work in a comedy’s favor, even one that employs shock value. Although it’s astonishing that the gag with an elderly woman in a nursing home was permitted in a PG-13 film, the rating requires a certain amount of nuance and cleverness that more graphic language and visuals don’t need. The laughs are produced from the tension between what’s suggested and shown. Frankly, it seems like the film gets away with more because it leads the audience to fill in the blanks rather than pounding us over the head with the jokes’ climaxes.

As Lloyd explains to Harry regarding his 20-year prank, some things are funnier the longer the punchline is delayed. Co-writers and directors Bobby and Peter Farrelly smartly execute low humor through constructed gags with several small rewards before the big payoffs. In the case of Harry’s pleasant memory being reproduced on a screen, the funniest aspect isn’t the filthy capper but an aside about shutting the door. DUMB AND DUMBER TO’s greater strength may be in the silly literalness with which its characters interact with the world, though. True to the film’s title the jokes are often dumb, like Lloyd and Harry pedaling their bicycle while it’s mounted on a bus’s rack, and dumber, such as a play on words with a highway named after an actress, but they’re delivered with such brio that it’s hard to resist the stupidity.

The Farrellys and four other credited screenwriters throw plenty of coarse jokes against the wall and many stick, but the film has patchy stretches, especially after Lloyd and Harry reach their destination. The plot merely serves as an excuse to link sketches involving the twosome acting like doofuses and thus doesn’t provide much momentum. Whenever it seems like DUMB AND DUMBER TO may be stalling out, along comes a puerile wisecrack or two to sustain the good will it was starting to lose.

The Farrellys put a good bit of craft in DUMB AND DUMBER TO, even if their film is just an elevated version of kids in the cafeteria trying to crack up their friends. It’s as simple and amusing as watching Carrey wolf down a hot dog as though he’s Homer Simpson and then wiping his mouth with the bun that he throws away.

Grade: B-

22 Jump Street

22 JUMP STREET (Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, 2014)

A glance at Hollywood studios’ release schedules fat with sequels, remakes, and reboots conveys the message that if at first you succeed with something, repeat until you’ve wrung every last cent out of it. Directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller achieved the unlikely in guiding an adaptation of the late 1980s/early ‘90s TV series 21 JUMP STREET to creative and financial success, making 22 JUMP STREET a given. Like many follow-ups, this one essentially hits all of the same beats that worked before while tweaking the specifics enough to avoid being a complete rehash. The difference in 22 JUMP STREET is that screenwriters Michael Bacall, Oren Uziel, and Rodney Rothman call attention to the business of show with meta and comedic commentary on the nature of sequels.

Fresh off their effective undercover work as high school students, Jenko (Channing Tatum) and Schmidt (Jonah Hill) graduate to an assignment that sends them to college. Once again Captain Dickson (Ice Cube) tasks them with finding a drug supplier, but when it comes to social navigation, this time the script gets flipped. Schmidt was in his element in high school while Jenko failed to fit into the cool crowd. At Metro City State Jenko blends in easily, buddying up to quarterback and possible campus dealer Zook (Wyatt Russell). Schmidt struggles to make a positive impression on Zook and his fraternity brothers, leaving him to hang out with art majors like Maya (Amber Stevens), who lives with the girl whose former roommate’s death from the drug generated their investigation.

Whether it’s because duplicating the original film’s structure and plot points is the easiest option or the audience is anticipated not to care, 22 JUMP STREET spares no opportunity to point out the crass recycling in sequels. Like Schmidt’s hilarious stab at slam poetry at open mic night, itself a callback to his audition in the first JUMP STREET, the film deconstructs the very thing it’s engaging in. Winking acknowledgements of an unnecessary bigger budget and narrative repetitions avoid being cutesy excuses for screenwriting laziness because the ruthless jokes consistently hit their marks. In its own way 22 JUMP STREET is a work of film criticism that mocks the lack of originality in endeavors like this. When Jenko drills several holes in a small area for hidden cameras, it’s not unlike an industry that time and again mines a diminished number of established properties for box office returns.

Lord and Miller started as directors in animation with the TV series CLONE HIGH and moved on to films with CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS and THE LEGO MOVIE. They bring some of their cartoon sensibility to 22 JUMP STREET. An early action setpiece atop a moving truck turns the heroes into Looney Tunes made flesh, and a drug trip sequence places them side by side in exaggerated scenery for their contrasting experiences. Perhaps their work in animation explains why a significant amount of the humor is visual. Through editing and framing, sometimes in split screen, they compare Jenko and Schmidt’s vastly different physical abilities with amusing results. Jokes in the background, like a hall named after fonts and a sped-up chase in front of the Benjamin Hill Center for Film Studies, are there for viewers to discover than have hammered home. Lord and Miller assume a greater amount of audience perceptiveness than other broad comedies that repeat and explain jokes for the less engaged. Creed’s “Higher” plays during Schmidt’s bad trip, but it’s never pointed out, just left there for the viewer to pick up on the implication that it’s what is playing in hell.

Tatum and Hill have great comedic chemistry as the mismatched stud and schlub, and the performances are again a large part of the film’s appeal. Tatum in particular is endearingly funny playing a big dummy who mangles words like annals and carte blanche and tries on a ridiculous, pinched accent when called upon to follow Schmidt’s lead in a meeting with criminals. The verbal humor comes in flurries and is epitomized when Jillian Bell’s Mercedes works Schmidt like a speed bag with her quips about his age. Despite all of the wisecracks and visual gags, the funniest bit comes in a character-based scene at parents’ weekend. 22 JUMP STREET makes no bones about repeating what worked the first time around and suggests there could be an endless crop of installments. If this film series can continue to deliver more of the same consistent laughs, keep ‘em coming.

Grade: B

Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues

ANCHORMAN 2: THE LEGEND CONTINUES (Adam McKay, 2013)

The saying doesn’t go that the family that reads the news together stays together, but it ought to as far as Ron Burgundy (Will Ferrell) is concerned.  Ron and his wife Veronica Corningstone (Christina Applegate) are living the dream as television news co-anchors at a New York City network affiliate in ANCHORMAN 2: THE LEGEND CONTINUES until she is selected over him to fill the opening on the six o’clock evening broadcast.  To make matters worse, Ron is fired.  For a man who places his self-worth in his occupation--OK, and his hair too--it’s more than he can take.  He abandons Veronica and their six-year-old son and returns to San Diego with the hope of reclaiming past glory.

Renewed fame and fortune aren’t awaiting him, sending Ron into a depression, but the big break he needs arrives in the nick of time.  Freddie Shapp (Dylan Baker) approaches with the offer of manning the desk at Global News Network, the first 24-hour cable news channel.  Ron tracks down former members of his news team Champ Kind (David Koechner), Brian Fantana (Paul Rudd), and Brick Tamland (Steve Carell) and goes back to New York to take his rightful place in front of the TelePrompter.  Relegated to the dead of night shift, Ron has no choice but to traffick in sensationalism.

Many Hollywood comedies, especially sequels, play it safe by giving audiences more of what they already approved.  Ferrell and co-writer and director Adam McKay certainly don’t skimp on repeating by slightly tweaking similar bits that fans loved in the original 2004 film.  They also acknowledge the fans by giving popular secondary characters showcase moments, although such inclusions can make ANCHORMAN 2 seem overstuffed.  In addition to the tried-and-true, they make room for a lot of new and strange comedic ideas.  Not all of the weird straying from the otherwise straightforward redemption story hits the mark.  Ron’s self-imposed isolation in a lighthouse after losing his sight takes things too far afield for too long without enough payoffs in laughs.  Still with something this ambitious the clunkers have to be taken with the good, of which there’s a sufficient amount.

ANCHORMAN 2 sets its satirical aim on the 24/7 news cycle, a fat and deserving target if ever there was one.  Anymore it seems as though Sidney Lumet’s NETWORK is being referenced as a how-to guide for ratings chasing above all than understood as a denouncement of it.  The absurd content that Ron and team favor to fill their news hole permits ANCHORMAN 2 to make its points humorously and effectively that the public gets the news it deserves when it chooses to reward bottom of the barrel reporting.  Ferrell and McKay aren’t letting the information gatekeepers off the hook, but their serious message couched in silly jokes is that infotainment and manufactured outrage are not in the best interest of viewers.

Although media criticism provides weight to ANCHORMAN 2, the escalation of jokes, obvious and obscure referential humor, and sheer number of oddball gags ensure that the film doesn’t forget that its primary purpose is to amuse.  Its hit-to-miss ratio can seem inconsistent, but that’s only because so much is thrown out there to determine what plays.  Ferrell has his share of duds on his filmography, a fact that holds true for anyone who works as often as he does and takes so many risks as an actor, screenwriter, and producer.  Nevertheless, as reflected in his overall body of work and ANCHORMAN 2, his comedic instincts are correct enough to make him worth trusting more than his contemporaries.

Grade: B

Men in Black 3

MEN IN BLACK 3 (Barry Sonnenfeld, 2012)

Agent J (Will Smith) must time-jump to the summer of 1969 to save his partner and the planet in MEN IN BLACK 3.  He’s in pursuit of Boris The Animal (Jemaine Clement), a notorious alien killer who escapes from a maximum security prison on the moon and is hellbent on visiting the past so he can eliminate Agent K (Tommy Lee Jones in the present-day scenes, Josh Brolin in 1969).

Boris succeeds, which wipes K from the memories of everyone at Men in Black headquarters except for J.  This historical revision means that K was never able to put a safety shield around Earth, thus making it susceptible to invasion from Boris’s warmongering race, the Boglodites.  New chief Agent O (Emma Thompson) figures out that time travel has been involved and dispatches J to restore order by time-jumping to a day before his gruff associate’s death at the Apollo 11 launch and stopping Boris.

MEN IN BLACK 3 arrives fifteen years after the original and a decade after the franchise’s first sequel.  Consider this installment a reunion in which Smith is in charge of assuring everyone that it will be a good time and Jones makes a token appearance because he’s obligated to do so.  Inevitably someone has work done to maintain a youthful appearance at these get-togethers.  To keep up with the times it is rendered in 3D. 

MEN IN BLACK 3 can be a pleasant reminder of goofy, special effects-laden summer blockbusters of old that weren’t preoccupied with origin stories, world-building, and their own importance and seriousness.  Director Barry Sonnenfeld’s sci-fi comedy maintains a breezy tone that keeps it agreeable even when the lightness feels more forced than natural.  The good jokes in MEN IN BLACK 3 don’t nudge the needle much on the laugh-o-meter while the unsuccessful ones land softly instead of hitting with a thud.  

The millions lavished on creature designs and action scenes are meant to impress, yet the filmmakers are less concerned with drawing attention to the expense than delighting in the absurdity of how the aliens look and the craziness of the scenarios.  Despite the huge budget, MEN IN BLACK 3 is comfortable as a B movie and isn’t trying to prove itself as anything else.

Brolin’s impersonation is so good it wouldn’t be a shock to learn that the performance is actually achieved through CGI wizardry de-aging the crusty Jones instead of a younger colleague imitating him.  In supporting roles Michael Stuhlbarg adds genuine sweetness as Griffin, an alien who can envision the multiple conclusions of every scenario, and Bill Hader gets laughs with his zany spin on Andy Warhol.

MEN IN BLACK 3’s modest charms aren’t plentiful.  The mild laughs come sporadically.  It delivers what is expected, more or less, and doesn’t strain in the effort. The eager-to-please attitude and sleek sets provide relief from the somber mood and environments in vogue in tentpole films.  As far as unnecessary sequels are concerned, MEN IN BLACK 3 is a serviceable addition to the series.  

Grade: C+

Paranormal Activity 2

PARANORMAL ACTIVITY 2 (Tod Williams, 2010)

Rather than picking up where PARANORMAL ACTIVITY left off, PARANORMAL ACTIVITY 2 goes back to explain where the demon that tormented Katie and Micah came from and what it wants. This sequel/prequel observes Katie’s sister Kristi Rey (Sprague Grayden) and her family, which includes husband Dan (Brian Boland), stepdaughter Ali, and their infant son Hunter.

One day the Reys come home to find that an intruder has wrecked their house, although the only thing that seems to be missing is a necklace Katie gave Kristi. Sufficiently spooked, they install multiple security cameras, but strange things happening around the house keep Kristi in particular on edge. Unexplainable noises awaken the baby. A pan is knocked from its secured storage spot. The pool cleaner mysteriously is removed from the pool overnight. Over time the disturbances become more aggressive.

Following the series’ conceit of presenting edited found footage, PARANORMAL ACTIVITY 2 consists of house surveillance videos and some interactions caught by camcorder. Much of what’s captured on tape and hard drives is mundane, but it’s precisely the ordinariness and long takes in these scenes that can make them so unnerving when the supernatural element disrupts the tranquility. For instance, watching someone sit at a kitchen island isn’t inherently compelling, but the anticipation of something happening while patiently focusing on the scene pays off with a massive jolt when the cabinets and drawers explode open for no reason.

It’s in this manner that PARANORMAL ACTIVITY 2 consistently succeeds at constructing jump moments with deliberation during routine home settings. The scares in PARANORMAL ACTIVITY 2 aren’t as frequent or always as well built as the original film’s, but those that exist are still pretty effective. In day-to-day life, unseen things that go bump in the night, or the daytime for that matter, have a way of frightening the living daylights out of us. The same applies to the movies.

Grade: B-

Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs

ICE AGE: DAWN OF THE DINOSAURS (Carlos Saldanha and Mike Thurmeier, 2009)

When sitcom characters start getting married and having children, the developments often indicate that the creative wells in the writers' rooms are running dry. These warning signs are all over the ICE AGE series, which has now yielded two sequels, with more likely to come as long as the box office receipts, not worthwhile untold stories, warrant them.

The original 2002 animated film was pleasant enough as it followed the comedic exploits of prehistoric creatures during the glacial period, but it didn't suggest untapped tales about these characters. 2006's subpar follow-up ICE AGE: THE MELTDOWN introduced a spouse for woolly mammoth Manny (Ray Romano). As ICE AGE: DAWN OF THE DINOSAURS opens, Manny and his beloved Ellie (Queen Latifah) are waiting for the arrival of their first fuzzy bundle of joy, something which has the expectant pop in a tizzy to childproof the frozen landscape they call home.

The impending mammoth domesticity has other members of the multiple species herd feeling left out. Saber-toothed tiger Diego (Denis Leary) notices that he's losing his predatory edge and elects to strike out on his own. Sid the sloth (John Leguizamo) is mindful that he is experiencing some parental stirrings, but with no nearby female sloths to speak of, he must build a family by adopting three abandoned eggs he discovers underneath the ice.

When the eggs hatch, Sid becomes the dutiful caregiver to Tyrannosaurus rex triplets, but his happiness is shortlived when the displeased momma T. rex comes looking for her babies. She hauls off Sid and the kids to an underground land where some dinosaurs survived the global freeze. Loyal to a fault, Sid's friends venture on a rescue mission by journeying below the ice. There they fall under the leadership of the wily and possibly crazy weasel Buck (Simon Pegg).

Breaking up the main story is saber-toothed squirrel Scrat's never-ending pursuit of an acorn. The addition of the female Scratte for this third go-round presents competition and a love interest for the tireless forager. Scrat's wordless vignettes have been highlights of the previous ICE AGE films, and the nutty scenarios he gets into again are among the funniest parts of this one. Whether straining to be freed from the tar adhering him to a tree or bopping along in a bubble after that darn acorn, Scrat's scenes possess an unforced silliness missing in the primary story.

ICE AGE: DAWN OF THE DINOSAURS needs injections of cartoon merriment and orneriness to cure the blandness afflicting the plot and characters. Buck has his humorously unhinged moments, and Sid's sweet goofiness earns a smile here and there. Otherwise a great affinity with those in the herd isn't developed.

The animation is solid and features a couple nice action setpieces that probably look neat in 3-D--I saw the 2-D version--but what lingers is the predictability and indistinctiveness of it all. ICE AGE: DAWN OF THE DINOSAURS had to concoct an explanation for shoehorning the extinct reptiles into the timeline, so why limit the dinos' expressiveness to mere grunts and roars? It's just one of several signs that the film's modest creative hits and misses qualify it as an unremarkable, fitfully diverting effort than a mammoth letdown.

Grade: C

(Photo credit: Blue Sky Studios, TM and © Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. All Rights Reserved.)

Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian

NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM: BATTLE OF THE SMITHSONIAN (Shawn Levy, 2009)

In NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM: BATTLE OF THE SMITHSONIAN Larry Daley (Ben Stiller) has traded in his night security guard uniform for a suit and tie as an inventor and TV pitchman. He still swings by the Museum of Natural History to see his old friends that make up the exhibits, but his visits have become fewer during the couple years since their initial adventure.

Larry learns that new interactive holographic terminals are replacing the old displays, which are being packed and shipped to the Smithsonian's archives. Ahkmenrah's tablet is staying in New York, though, which means that miniature cowboy Jedediah (Owen Wilson), Roman soldier Octavius (Steve Coogan), and pals will not come to life at night in Washington D.C.

To their benefit and Larry's aggravation, the sticky-fingered Capuchin monkey steals the tablet and takes it along to the Smithsonian. There the pharoah Kahmunrah (Hank Azaria) tries to get it so he can summon an underworld army to help him rule the planet. Larry poses as a security guard so he can infiltrate the nineteen Smithsonian museums and thwart the pharoah's plans.

NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM: BATTLE OF THE SMITHSONIAN collects and unveils a who's who of television and film comedians like an institution amasses and showcases artifacts. Jonah Hill gets a funny scene as a Smithsonian guard who confronts Stiller as he is about to touch an exhibit. Bill Hader contributes some amusing moments as a tactically-challenged General Custer who is obsessed with his golden locks.

Azaria's Kahmunrah draws laughs from overestimating what he deems to be his fearsome resurrection, and in a charming turn Amy Adams plays aviation pioneer Amelia Earhart as a screwball spitfire. Ricky Gervais and Mindy Kaling are also worth noting in minor roles while Christopher Guest as Ivan the Terrible and THE OFFICE'S Craig Robinson are among those whose talents are squandered.

Descended from the big budget family films of the 1980s, the first NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM was an enjoyable amusement park ride through the halls of history. The sequel has its moments too, mostly due to the fine cast, but this repeat spin gets a little wearying.

The fatigue stems from the characters running among buildings on the National Mall rather than kicking back with old favorites and new acquaintances alike. Just like on a family's summer vacation, when the pressure is on to cram in as many activities and to appeal to every member every second, NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM: BATTLE OF THE SMITHSONIAN can be too cluttered and hyperactive to appreciate its broad pleasures.

Grade: C+

(Photos TM and © Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. All Rights Reserved.)

National Treasure: Book of Secrets

NATIONAL TREASURE: BOOK OF SECRETS (Jon Turteltaub, 2007)

When Mitch Wilkinson (Ed Harris) reveals a long-missing page from John Wilkes Booth's diary to the public, treasure hunter extraordinaire Ben Gates (Nicolas Cage) couldn't be more dismayed. His great-grandfather Thomas Gates is potentially implicated in the plot to assassinate Abraham Lincoln.

In NATIONAL TREASURE: BOOK OF SECRETS Ben must again find and decipher the clues that will absolve his ancestor and possibly lead to a fabled city of gold that the Confederates sought. He reteams with technology whiz Riley Poole (Justin Bartha), adventure-seeking father Patrick (Jon Voight), and archivist and former squeeze Abigail Chase (Diane Kruger). New to the crew is his mother Emily Appleton (Helen Mirren), a Native American language expert whose acrimonious split from Patrick is as bitter as ever despite the intervening years.

Their search includes visits to Paris, Buckingham Palace, Mount Vernon, and Mount Rushmore and a most unlikely abduction of the President of the United States (Bruce Greenwood). The President is the only one with access to a secret book that is rumored to be passed from the nation's outgoing chief executive to the incoming. The book is a conspiracy theorist's wet dream, but getting one's hands on it is next to impossible. Since a key piece of information is probably in that book, Ben has to steal the President away for a short while and hope he's a good sport about it.

Like its predecessor, NATIONAL TREASURE: BOOK OF SECRETS plunders national monuments and documents for elaborately coded messages that will help the heroes on their mission. Any complaints about realism or the utility of these century-old (and older) methods of concealing information are beside the point. NATIONAL TREASURE and its sequel are intended to be rollicking, old-time adventures. They're about the thrill of the chase accompanied by rosy views of patriotism and history.

Director Jon Turteltaub and the cast march through the paces with enthusiasm, but there's one crucial problem amid the onslaught of riddles and historical mysteries. No, it's not that the characters know the answers to the secrets faster than Ken Jennings would buzz in at a sports bar's electronic trivia game. The audience's inability to participate in cracking the codes sucks a lot of the fun out of the process.

There's no way to outguess Ben and company because viewers aren't given the means to play along. Instead, it would be as though everything underneath a car's hood was disassembled and set on the garage floor. A mechanic would return everything to its proper place in record time and then turn around to ask, "Got that?" One can see how he attained the result but not have any real understanding of what was done. The film does the same thing. The process is broken down, but there's no way to arrive at those conclusions independently.

Unlike the Indiana Jones films, rough models for these movies, the characters don't capture our imaginations because there is little romance in their pursuits. They're shoved from location to location like stops on an assembly line. Practically a duplicate of the breezy (and bloated) original, NATIONAL TREASURE: BOOK OF SECRETS is not without charm, but it lacks the thrill seeker's joy of discovery.

Grade: C+