Down on "Dupree"
Down on Dupree
Reviews of You, Me and Dupree (Universal, 7.14) are starting to show up so here goes my own. As an exercise in eccentricity I thought I'd run my thoughts raw, as I first expressed them in an e-mail a few days ago.
But first the basics: Carl Peterson (Matt Dillon) is an affable guy with a new wife, Molly (Kate Hudson), and a new job working for her tyrannical egotistical land- developer dad (Michael Douglas...obvious echoes of De Niro's psycho-pop in Meet the Parents). Enter Carl's best friend Randy Dupree (Wilson), an amiable slacker who can't hold a job and has lost his apartment, so Carl takes pity and invites him to stay in his and Molly's home...for a short while.
Kate Hudson, Owen Wilson and Matt Dillon in Joe and Anthony Russo's You, Me and Dupree
"Oh my God...oh my God," my letter began.
"You must know that You, Me and Dupree is easily one of the worst films of the year. Slapdash, undisciplined, uninispired and sans compass or clues. It's Boudou Saved From Drowning and The Man Who Came to Dinner subjected to devolution, the TV backgrounds of co-directors Joe and Anthony Russo, and the enthralling comic vision of producers Scott Stuber and Mary Parent.
"I don't want to sound harsh or intemperate, but if I was running Universal I wouldn't hire the Russo brothers to be gate guards.
"There is one scene that works, in which Owen gives a rousing speech about different lifestyles and modes of growth to a classroom of eight year olds. It's been dubbed 'the Mothership' scene on this Yahoo page.
"I'll always love Owen Wilson and Dillon is actually pretty good, and Michael Douglas has obviously had some great work done and has dieted a lot of pounds off and has a great wardrobe guy to boot.
"Hudson is okay but she's not exactly a comedian -- she's more of an aura lady -- but over the last six years she's hasn't landed anything nearly as good as the role she played in Almost Famous, and she's gotten weaker and less connected as the years have rolled by.
"Thank God for Owen. He plays the same spirited spiritual-flotation-device spacehead in every film he's in, and he's always great at it, and that's what makes him a bona fide star. Even though he doesn't really 'open' anything.
"But woebetide this movie. I leaned over and said to [name of a guy] sitting next to me about 35 minutes into it, 'This isn't very funny.' And then it got worse and worse.
"If the Russos were geniuses, they might have transformed this thing into some- thing resembling Jonathan Demme's Something Wild. You know it, right? Some say it's Demme's best film ever.
"The Russos could have run with the ball and made it lame-funny at first, but gradually darker and meaner and nastier. They could have had Dillon get into a car accident and maybe kill a pedestrian and wind up in jail and turning into a thief. Hudson and Wilson could have had an affair, and Douglas could have hired Owen and fired Dillon, and then Douglas could have seen his business fall apart for some reason. And Owen could have become a gleeful villain with a serious psycho streak.
"It could have been amazing -- a movie that starts out as an exercise in "comic" tedium and morphs into a kind of melodrama-horror film. Startling, breathtaking... the audience wouldn't know what to think or feel, but they'd definitely be talking it up.
"But not with the Russos as they really (apparently) are. Not with Stuber and Parent involved. Not with Universal's committee process in place.
"I really think the people who helped make this thing need to leave town and go to an ashram somewhere deep in the Mexican mountains and ask themselves, 'What am I doing with my life? What have I become? How do I live with myself after this?'
"As soon as it ended last night, the theatre emptied out like that. People sticking around for the closing credits is always a good sign that a film has affected viewers on some level. But people couldn't get out of there fast enough.
"Every which way this movie is a tank, an embarassment...a fountain of eternal shame and remorse."
Posted by Jeffrey Wells on July 12, 2006 at 12:23 PM
comment #1
jon rahoi says ...
just testing comments - nothing to see here
Posted by jon rahoi at July 12, 2006 2:55 PM
comment #2
Greg says ...
Something Wild was okay, but for a Heads head like me, he'll always be the guy who filmed Stop Making Sense.
Posted by Greg at July 12, 2006 3:14 PM
comment #3
jj says ...
Don't blame the Russo's they directed multiple episodes of the amazingly funny Arrested Development. I read the Dupree sciprt about a year ago and knew it was going to be a horrible movie about 35 pages in. I was hoping that the comedic talent would make the material better but I guess not.
Will any comedy be funny this year? It's sad to say that the funniest film I have seen all year is "Grandma's Boy." Trust me, I had my doubts too, but I rented it last week and laughed my ass off.
Posted by jj at July 12, 2006 3:32 PM
comment #4
Mark says ...
Didn't you already expel Doug Liman to the Mexican mountains after Mr. and Mrs. Smith?
Why pick on the Russos? They already went the way of the black, bleak, and nuanced comedy in Welcome to Colinwoon, and that led them straight to TV. Can you blame someone for trying to go broader and lighter, to actually make a movie that people will see?
I'm sure they'd now rather make Something About Mary (SAM) than Something Wild, and that's plenty understandable. Now maybe they failed at making SAM, but I think you're still being overly cruel to some young filmmakers.
Posted by Mark at July 12, 2006 3:33 PM
comment #5
Hopscotch says ...
I agree that Arrested Development is a great show, one of the best out there. My hat is off to any one who worked on that show creatively, that includes you Russo Bros.
But Mitch Hurwitz is the brains behind that operation. Jay Chandresakar (you know, who directed Dukes of Hazzard) directed an episode of AD. he doesn't get any slack does he? Nope. should he? not at all.
I still kind of want to see this...but I'll pass.
Posted by Hopscotch at July 12, 2006 3:44 PM
comment #6
Daniel Zelter says ...
"The Russos could have run with the ball and made it lame-funny at first, but gradually darker and meaner and nastier. They could have had Dillon get into a car accident and maybe kill a pedestrian and wind up in jail and turning into a thief. Hudson and Wilson could have had an affair, and Douglas could have hired Owen and fired Dillon, and then Douglas could have seen his business fall apart for some reason. And Owen could have become a gleeful villain with a serious psycho streak."
Why not just watch Very Bad Things?
Posted by Daniel Zelter at July 12, 2006 3:47 PM
comment #7
mike says ...
I have to step up and defend the Russo brothers as well. They've done tremendous work on Arrested Development in the 3 seasons it was on, having directed a fair chunk of episodes that were all genuinely hilarious, sometimes moving. But there is talent to be displayed by them.
I think blame would have to go to Universal suits, who no doubt wanted something safe that could at the very least open big and go away, coasting on the residue of Wilson's Wedding Crashers fame. (Likewise The Break Up, but that wound up actually being good, which surprised a lot of folk, including our own Mr. Wells).
Everything about this film screams "Middle Of The Road", from the bland poster to the trailers that give away all the "hilarious" jokes. While Welcome To Collinwood wasn't perfect, it had a voice. It looks like the brothers couldn't speak up on this one, either out of fear or obligation to get it over with and make their next film. (Which, according to IMDB is to star Will Arnett, quite possibly the most brilliant comedic actor on Earth from the way he embodies GOB on Arrested Development).
This has studio fingerprints all over it.
Posted by mike at July 12, 2006 4:59 PM
comment #8
Nick says ...
Anyone who can screw up this concept needs to be loaded into a cannon, set up just below the hollywood sign, and be blown into Utah, its what they diserve. Too bad this one is still gonna open.
Posted by Nick at July 12, 2006 9:52 PM
comment #9
Skip Rooney says ...
No offense -- but, judging from the trailers and poster, does this review surprise anyone? I mean, did anybody out there expect this movie to be anything but 90 minutes of mediocrity at best?
Posted by Skip Rooney at July 13, 2006 3:43 AM
comment #10
Colin says ...
Stop Making Sense and Something Wild are neck and neck for my favorite Demme film. I think that Stop Making Sense is probably the vest music doc ever made, and Something Wild was one of the movies that made me really get into film.
Posted by Colin at July 13, 2006 6:02 AM
comment #11
RK says ...
The only thing that's somewhat inspired is the title of the movie.
I've said this before ... I'll say it again!
CAN'T ANYONE MAKE A GOOD MOVIE ANYMORE?!?!?!?
Posted by RK at July 13, 2006 8:10 AM
comment #12
Jesse says ...
I nearly chimed in with impassioned mentions of Arrested Development. Thanks to all who said it above.
Question: Was anyone else like me, and had no idea that Michael Douglas was in this movie until yesterday?
Posted by Jesse at July 13, 2006 8:13 AM
comment #13
Ryan Johnson says ...
I also have to jump on the pro-Russo bandwagon. Their "TV background" with Arrested Development is made up of quality work that bests even the best movie comedies of the past ten years. Let's not forget that Owen Wilson has some pretty fine credits, and he is a producer on Dupree and he reportedly was very involved with the script. This film is clearly a waste of a lot of talented people.
Dupree looks bad, and I imagine I'll steer clear of it, but it doesn't seem fair to dismiss the Russos as having a TV background when that particular work is so stellar.
Posted by Ryan Johnson at July 13, 2006 8:07 PM
comment #14
Jeremy says ...
ARRRRRRGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH! I saw this movie today because Devil Wears Prada was sold out, and I was with three friends...dear god. This movie was two hours of my life that I'm never getting back. The first forty minutes were a below average comedy, but it got a few laughs out of me because Owen Wilson can definitely sell a joke. But the movie was so woefully mis-structured and misguided...I didn't care about the Matt Dillon character enough to invest in him in the second and third acts, and so much of it just needed to be re-arranged and re-directed and just--you know, this movie didn't have to be re-anything.
Remember how George Lucas said once that if he had a sledgehammer, he'd destroy every known copy of the Star Wars Christmas special? While you're at it George, please prevent people from seeing this movie with your mighty sledgehammer. Please? FOR THE LOVE OF GOD PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Posted by Jeremy at July 15, 2006 10:05 PM