Dinner for Schmucks
Director: Jay Roach
Screenplay: David Guion and Michael Handelman
2010
On paper, this seemed what could have been an amazing matchup. Steve Carell (formally of “The Office”) and Paul Rudd (I Love You, Man) are apart of this new comedy which has emerged over the past five years who have seldomly disappointed. Through in a successful director in Jay Roach (Austin Powers, Meet the Fockers) and we have what we thought would be comedy at a very high level. Instead what we saw on film was a complete waste of time and a lack of timely jokes and sincere comedy.
The story is centered around Tim Conrad (Paul Rudd) who is an financial executive in the corporate world. After impressing his fellow co-workers and the head of the company (Bruce Greenwood), he is invited to attend a dinner where the goal is the bring the biggest idiot or “schmuck” to be made fun of. Tim, good natured at heart, is quite hesitant and looks for ways out of the dinner, especially after his girlfriend Julie (Stephanie Szostak) shows grave disappointment in him that he even considered. However, after a run in with Barry (Steve Carell), Tim realizes he has found the perfect man for the dinner. For the next 45 minutes of the film, we are faced with countless attempts of slapstick humor and Steve Carell comedy that we quickly forget what the movie is supposed to be about. We see Tim try desperately to have Barry not mess him life bad enough and get him to that dinner so he can get that promotion. And then come the mice...
“Dinner for Schmucks” for me was truly a movie for Schmucks. The underlining message of “being an idiot is okay as long as you do not know you are an idiot” was badly played out and made everyone in the audience seem like a fool. As I was leaving the theater, I became even more upset, thinking to myself why is Steve Carell leaving “The Office” to make movies like this? Paul Rudd tries his best to keep the morale of the movie positive, but at the end of the day, it just is not enough.
1/4
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