| YOU, ME AND DUPREE |
 2006 - USADirectors: Joe Russo, Anthony Russo
- Reviewed by Vickie
Matt Dillon fills in for what we can only assume is an unavailable Ben Stiller, since Matt’s role of stressed-out development exec, Carl Peterson, has Ben written all over it. Sadly, Dillon seems like a square peg being rammed into a round hole here, and plays it too straight to be remotely funny. Anyway… Workaholic Carl is newly married to Molly (Kate Hudson) and, like a couple out of Stepford, the two are about to begin their picture-perfect-if-somewhat-plastic new life together when Carl’s free-spirit of a best friend, Dupree (Owen Wilson), announces that he’s lost his job and his apartment. He’s got nowhere to go, so the Petersons reluctantly open their doors. “It’s just for a few days,” Carl promises Molly, but as anyone who’s seen the commercials knows, Dupree quickly becomes the barnacle on the couple’s sailboat of life. Dupree is a slacker, plain and simple. Lovable, sure, but directionless and completely content with just coasting wherever the world takes him. That’s fine, but Molly’s ready for her freeloading houseguest to pack up and move on. Eventually, Carl hops on her heave-ho bandwagon and soon they’re both prepping Dupree’s walking papers. But, because this is a terribly formulaic and predictable film, the tables soon turn and, after a series of boring events, it’s Carl who begins to come off like an unwanted visitor in his own life. You, Me and Dupree isn’t unwatchable. It’s not painful to sit through and it won’t make you sad for the state of moviemaking in Hollywood. But it’s also just kind of ordinary. It is, in a word, meh. The story is uninspired and you can telegraph the ending pretty much from the get-go. As mentioned, Dillon is out of place and off his game here, but Hudson doesn’t fare much better in what’s essentially just the standard-issue “girlfriend” role. Her character is even stuck with the stereotypical profession of schoolteacher—a job that makes her simultaneously lovable (“awww, she helps kids!”) and boring (“oh look, another beautiful woman working in the thankless education field in order to show the audience that she’s a selfless, good person”). The filmmakers don’t even bother to include any other female characters, at all, so Molly’s got no friends, no sisters, nobody to talk to. It shortchanges both Hudson and her character, and reminds us that this movie’s all about the boys. With Dillon stiff as a board onscreen, Wilson at least manages to have some fun with his character, and his “throwing 7 kinds of smoke” chase sequence is one of the film’s few highlights. Dupree, for all his faults (and there are many), is endearing and likable and, without question, colorful. His actions border on unforgivable, but Wilson makes sure to bat his puppy-dog eyes while spouting big-picture life lessons about finding one’s “-ness,” that make his missteps promptly overlooked. The same cannot be said for the folks behind the movie itself, though. They misstep all over the place and I’m not ready to forgive them. They lose slices for the hum-drum story, the woeful attempts at American Pie-esque humor (there’s porn and a sock and that’s all I’m sayin’), the underwritten Molly character and general lack of a female perspective, and their shameless stunt casting (Michael Douglas as Hudson’s control-freak father and Harry Dean Stanton as a bar patron, for starters), which serves only as a distraction. Again, the movie isn’t horrible. But it’s not one you need to rush out and see, either. |
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You, Me and Dupree is sort of like a peanut butter sandwich on
Wonder bread. It’s fine if you’re looking for something basic and
uncomplicated, but it’s not entirely satisfying or particularly
imaginative. And, you know, if you have any kind of nut allergy you may
wish to stay away.
