Tuesday, November 11, 2014

Movie Review: "Dumb and Dumber" (1994)

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Movie"Dumb and Dumber"
Director: Peter & Bobby Farrelly
Year: 1994
Rating: PG-13
Running Time: 1 hour, 47 minutes

Lloyd Christmas (Jim Carrey) is a limo driver and a total idiot. Lloyd drives a woman named Mary Swanson (Lauren Holly) to the airport for her trip to Aspen. Mary leaves her briefcase by the airport escalator and Lloyd retrieves the briefcase but is unable to get it to her before take-off. What Lloyd doesn't know is the briefcase was full of ransom money for Mary's kidnapped husband. Now, the kidnappers think Lloyd is involved and are after him. Lloyd is infatuated with Mary and wants to take the briefcase to her in Aspen and convinces his equally moronic roomate Harry (Jeff Daniels) to drive him there. Lloyd and Harry leave on a cross-country road trip from Rhode Island to Aspen to return the briefcase, all the while being pursued by a pair of murderous kidnappers.  

To be honest, we were sort of excited when we heard a sequel to this movie was being made......18 years ago.

There is quite a bit of topical humor pertinent to the early 90's in this movie. There is a parody of the "Pretty Woman" montage that could be considered timeless, but was much more fresh in the early 90's than in 2014. This may have lost some of its impact 20 years later. Whether situational or not, the humor found here is the typical Farrelly brothers over-the-top slapstick, stupid, kind of dirty and raunchy humor, just toned down for a PG-13 rating. This doesn't mean that there aren't a lot of poop and pee jokes, because there are. Jim Carrey does his typical Jim Carrey thing with flailing body parts, outrageous faces and movements, and silly noises, though both he and Jeff Daniels play their idiot roles convincingly well and they way they play off of each other is kind of brilliant. The humor that does work is due to the delivery of Carrey and Daniels, though there are only a few brief breaks from the overall stupidity. Carrey and Daniels manage to have a little bit of charm through their idiocy and oblivious nature, but a lot of times that charm is quickly erased by an explosive diarrhea scene. It helps that there is an overlying plot about the kidnappers chasing them to Aspen, but extra characters only means more people to talk to about doody. Mike Starr, who plays one of the kidnappers, has some good comedic moments as well, but his comedy is much more of a straight-man style than a raucous riot.

The humor isn't the only thing that feels dated in this film, and we're left scratching our heads as to why they would make a sequel 20 years later for reasons other than money, but we digress and will look forward to it with open arms??? It should be noted, though, that this movie is extremely quotable even today, so at least not everything is outdated. Despite its overall stupidity and raunchy nature, it still manages to make me giggle and to make BigJ laugh out loud here and there. It is tolerable for Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels' chemistry alone, so there might be a little hope left for the sequel. Who knows, only time, and us this weekend, will tell!

My Rating: 6.5/10
BigJ's Rating: 7/10
IMDB's Rating: 7.3/10
Rotten Tomatoes Rating: 65%
Do we recommend this movie: Sure, why not?
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One year ago, we were watching: "Last Vegas"

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