‘Hall Pass’

Director: Bobby and Peter Farrelly

Starring: Owen Wilson, Jason Sudeikis, Jenna Fischer, Christina Applegate

Title idea: Pass on it

Sub-header idea:

1.5/5 popcorns

Oh, how the mighty have fallen. With the failure of ‘Hall Pass,’ Bobby and Peter Farrelly have not made a single great, or even decent, comedy in more than a decade. The writer-directors of comedic masterpieces ‘Dumb and Dumber’ (1994) and ‘There’s Something About Mary’ (1997) have been tumbling downhill for the past few years and now show slight signs of regaining their initially perfect form. Once the most promising pair of comedy directors since Woody Allen in the ’60s, the brothers have since become increasingly dull and unoriginal filmmakers.

‘Hall Pass’ is certainly no exception. Born from a relatively interesting concept, the film is played out by an exceptionally talented quartet of comedic actors and actresses, making the Farrelly brothers’ inability to extract riotous laughs all the more disappointing.

Successful white-collar workers Rick (Owen Wilson) and Fred (Jason Sudeikis) enjoy comfortable married lives,but as they near middle age, they realize how direly they yearn for the freedom that defined their youth. Rick has a beautiful, caring wife in Maggie (Jenna Fischer), and Fred has the same in Grace (Christina Applegate). The wives are so loving that upon recognizing their husbands’ fervent desires to remember how to play the field, they give them a week of freedom from marriage.

Rick and Fred have held onto their confidence in pursuing women but soon realize they’re not quite as suave or appealing as they used to be. Much to their surprise, women are not falling over themselves to hook up with them, and reality smacks them much harder than they could have anticipated. As they continue to flounder in the single world,they realize how much they care for their wives, but consequences naturally accompany every marital decision.

The film doesn’t scratch the surface of its potential, mostly due to the Farrelly brothers’ carelessness in crafting the story and characters with some originality. Even though Wilson and Sudeikis are two of the most good-natured actors on the planet, their characters are so unlikable that the film becomes borderline distancing. Not only are the two unlikable and difficult to side with, but they’re far too similar and don’t complement each other in any way. There might as well have been only one of them.

Even when the Farrelly brothers are in their comfort zone, reveling in their preferred arena of gross-out humor, the comedy never reaches the height it’s certainly capable of reaching. That disgusting humor is very funny in the moment, but like most of the laughs, it’s easily forgotten the moment the scene concludes. For the Farrelly brothers, gross-out humor has become a crutch rather than a hilarious comic trademark.

Occasionally misguided and underutilized by the filmmakers, the actors still try their best to make the movie watchable. Wilson and Sudeikis have terrific chemistry, while Fischer and Applegate are two of the finest comedic actresses working today. But the real gem is Stephen Merchant, who plays the male characters’ buddy, Gary, in the movie. The co-creator of ‘The Office,’ Merchant shines in his best American film role.

It might be too soon to write the Farrelly brothers off all together — they did make ‘Dumb and Dumber,’ after all — but it’s safe to say there isn’t a single director working in their field who is more in need of a hit.

smlittma@syr.edu

Published on March 2, 2011 at 12:00 pm