You, Me and Dupree: Movie & DVD Review (2006)

9/09/2007 Posted by Admin

Toxic love


(Originally published 2006)

In the comedy "You, Me and Dupree," the "You and Me" of the title are Carl and Molly Peterson (Matt Dillon, Kate Hudson), two newlyweds whose lives should presumably be infused with happiness, love, laughter, and plenty of good, uninterrupted sex.

At least for the first year.

But as the film's title suggests, they also must deal with Dupree (Owen Wilson), Carl's longtime best friend and the best man at their swanky island wedding whose life, shall we say, is lived a bit more unconventionally than most.

Dupree, you see, is something of a retro hippie throwback--with his bleached locks, surfer talk and surfer drag, he recalls a beach bum of yesteryear. And we all know how much fun they can be, particularly when they're close to 40 and can't hold a job, can't pay the rent, can't afford a car or any food to eat.

The bar Dupree frequents no longer wants much to do with him--apparently, there is plenty of competition for the cot in the back room--and so it comes down to Carl to help his wayward friend get back on his feet.

Predictably, that isn't so easy to do, particularly when you're dealing with an intrusive, amiable mess such as Dupree, who moves in with Carl and Molly and immediately turns the shaky first days of their marriage into turmoil.

The movie, which Anthony and Joe Russo based on Michael Le Sieur's script, seems like a natural extension of Wilson's last major hit, "The Wedding Crashers," in which he played a character who crashed weddings. On the other side of the altar, where he crashes the Peterson's marriage, things aren't nearly as bright or as funny--and don't blame the presence of a ring.

The trouble with "Dupree" goes beyond its idiot plot. For it to succeed, Wilson needed to bring an enormous groundswell of charm to the role. If he didn't (and he doesn't--all he brings is his usual bag of tricks), then how are we to believe that his character would be allowed to stay beneath Carl and Molly's roof when, at one point, he literally almost burns down the house beneath it?

For any movie to succeed, the audience must first be able to suspend a certain level of belief. If the balance is tipped too far, it can be increasingly difficult to keep the blinders on and just go along with whatever unfolds.

This is especially true for "Dupree," which in spite of a few mild laughs and a nicely oily performance by Michael Douglas as Molly's wealthy, meddling father, collapses the moment Dupree arrives at the Petersons' house with a giant moosehead in tow. Like so much of this movie, the moosehead is a broad gimmick, it isn't funny, and a better place for it would have been a toilet. You know, the one in which this movie naturally features yet another all-too-familiar-feeling scene.

Grade: C-

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1 comments:

  1. mohamed said...


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