Dumb and Dumber To
July 29, 2019 at 12:37 p.m.
By John Mulderig | Catholic News Service
NEW YORK -- We have it on the authority of Forrest Gump that stupid is as stupid does. And so it proves with the broad comedy sequel "Dumb and Dumber To" (Universal).
Its tiresome dopiness, however, isn't the main problem with the film: While many of the gags in co-directors (and brothers) Peter and Bobby Farrelly's lowbrow laffer are merely vulgar, a couple of scenes trigger such deep disgust that the whole can be endorsed for no one.
The script, in which the Farrellys also had a hand, along with four others, reunites Lloyd (Jim Carrey) and Harry (Jeff Daniels), the pair of nitwits whose earlier adventures in idiocy were charted in the 1994 original. Lloyd has spent the interval in a mental asylum pretending to be catatonic as a prolonged practical joke on Harry. But he snaps out of it on hearing that his buddy needs a kidney donor.
Together the friends set off in search of the most likely candidate, Penny (Rachel Melvin), the grown daughter Harry has only just discovered he has. In the process of tracking her down, they get mixed up with her adoptive dad, acclaimed scientist Dr. Pinchelow (Steve Tom), his scheming trophy wife, Adele (Laurie Holden), and their shifty handyman, Travis (Rob Riggle).
Dr. Pinchelow has invented a mysterious device with world-altering potential, the vastly profitable rights to which he plans to sign away. Predictably, Adele and Travis have other, less noble, ideas.
Given the adolescent pitch of the movie, it's hardly surprising that sex is a steady theme. But the utterly debased manner in which that subject is treated via the knuckleheads' interaction with an elderly lady in a nursing home and by way of a perverse childhood memory should warn off all self-respecting prospective viewers.
The film contains pervasive sexual and much scatological humor, some of it involving bestiality and other aberrations, brief irreverence, fleeting rear and partial nudity, at least one use each of profanity and the F-word and intermittent crude and crass language. The Catholic News Service classification is O -- morally offensive. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG-13 -- parents strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13.
Mulderig is on the staff of Catholic News Service.
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By John Mulderig | Catholic News Service
NEW YORK -- We have it on the authority of Forrest Gump that stupid is as stupid does. And so it proves with the broad comedy sequel "Dumb and Dumber To" (Universal).
Its tiresome dopiness, however, isn't the main problem with the film: While many of the gags in co-directors (and brothers) Peter and Bobby Farrelly's lowbrow laffer are merely vulgar, a couple of scenes trigger such deep disgust that the whole can be endorsed for no one.
The script, in which the Farrellys also had a hand, along with four others, reunites Lloyd (Jim Carrey) and Harry (Jeff Daniels), the pair of nitwits whose earlier adventures in idiocy were charted in the 1994 original. Lloyd has spent the interval in a mental asylum pretending to be catatonic as a prolonged practical joke on Harry. But he snaps out of it on hearing that his buddy needs a kidney donor.
Together the friends set off in search of the most likely candidate, Penny (Rachel Melvin), the grown daughter Harry has only just discovered he has. In the process of tracking her down, they get mixed up with her adoptive dad, acclaimed scientist Dr. Pinchelow (Steve Tom), his scheming trophy wife, Adele (Laurie Holden), and their shifty handyman, Travis (Rob Riggle).
Dr. Pinchelow has invented a mysterious device with world-altering potential, the vastly profitable rights to which he plans to sign away. Predictably, Adele and Travis have other, less noble, ideas.
Given the adolescent pitch of the movie, it's hardly surprising that sex is a steady theme. But the utterly debased manner in which that subject is treated via the knuckleheads' interaction with an elderly lady in a nursing home and by way of a perverse childhood memory should warn off all self-respecting prospective viewers.
The film contains pervasive sexual and much scatological humor, some of it involving bestiality and other aberrations, brief irreverence, fleeting rear and partial nudity, at least one use each of profanity and the F-word and intermittent crude and crass language. The Catholic News Service classification is O -- morally offensive. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG-13 -- parents strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13.
Mulderig is on the staff of Catholic News Service.
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