Old Dogs

Raise your hand if you're not an Oscar
winner disgracing yourself right now

Grade: D –

Director: Walt Becker

Starring: John Travolta, Robin Williams, Kelly Preston, Seth Green, Bernie Mac, Matt Dillon, and Justin Long

MPAA Rating: PG

Running Time: 1 hour, 28 minutes

As applied to its lead stars, the name Old Dogs is more apt than producers probably intended. John Travolta and Robin Williams play BFFs and business partners who glimpse midlife on the horizon and their best years in the rearview mirror. In other words, they suggest loose interpretations of their professional selves, and nothing encapsulates their deteriorating careers like this Disney drek.

Dan (Williams) and Charlie (Travolta) find their lifelong bromance threatened when Dan’s erstwhile one-night stand (Kelly Preston) suddenly shows up with his heretofore unknown twin moppets (Conner Rayburn and Ella Bleu Travolta), needing Dan to babysit while she does two weeks in the pokey. (Is it just me, or is it a bit creepy that Travolta’s real-life wife and daughter play Williams’ love interest and child?)

Life lessons about fatherhood allegedly ensue, including a weepy scene in which mom, daughter, and the law of movie morality expects Dan to jettison the multi-million dollar deal culminating he and Charlie’s 30-year career just so Dan can attend his daughter’s latest birthday party (I guess they didn’t think the first five or six were so important).

Director Walt Becker brandishes the dexterity of a hacksaw, like he did in his previous Travolta-starring calamity, Wild Hogs. Here, the entire film has only two gears: schmaltzy and farcical. The screenplay is nothing more than a series of barely connected sketches replete with gags about Asians, homo-anxiety, crotch-shots, and a dog with bladder control problems. There are also lots of human and animal reaction shots, plus uneven cameos. Only Matt Dillon and Justin Long acquit them well as gung-ho nature camp counselors. The rest of the supporting cast needs better agents or script-readers: Rita Wilson plays a cross-eyed hand model; Ann-Margret wanders in from the wilderness; and Bernie Mac is given nothing funny to say or do in this, his final film role before his untimely death in August 2008. Even the usually reliable Seth Green flounders; his only semi-amusing scene is already featured prominently in the film’s trailer.

It’s fitting that this big, unpalatable turkey is opening on Thanksgiving weekend. As it is, these Old Dogs need to be put down.

Neil Morris

Sex Drive

Sarah Palin's rallies are getting weirder and weirder

Grade: C +

Director: Sean Anders

Starring: Josh Zuckerman, Amanda Crew, Clark Duke, James Marsden, and Seth Green

MPAA Rating: R

Running Time: 1 hour, 49 minutes

How can a teen comedy be so edgy and yet so banal? If it is Sex Drive, the answer falls somewhere between Amish raves and Mexican-themed donut shops on the one hand, and scatological snickers and ethnic stereotyping on the other. A trio of high school seniors embark on a cross-country sojourn so hapless virgin Ian (Josh Zuckerman) can hook up with a blonde babe he met online. Along for the ride is Ian’s friend and inexplicable lady’s man, Lance (Clark Duke), and Ian’s BFF and latent inamorata, Felicia (Amanda Crew). Felicia secretly has the hots for Lance, but as these things usually go, it’s just a matter of time before Ian and Felicia’s romance orbits circle into alignment.

The always-reliable James Marsden is riotous as Ian’s roid ragin’ older brother, and Seth Green steals the entire film as an ultra-passive aggressive Amish Good Samaritan. Still, while Sex Drive has its share of guilty chuckles, the laugher feels as if it was grafted from the cadavers of departed teeny comedies. Moreover, the film’s eventual wholesome payoff, the romance spark between Ian and Felicia and, to an even lesser extent, Lance and a naughty Amish vixen, does not burn hot enough to disinfect the bathroom glory holes and assorted other potty humor. A film like American Pie possessed both audacity and adolescent charm. Sex Drive takes some amusing detours, but it’s ultimately a road trip to nowhere.

Neil Morris