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Paul
Rudd is one of my
favorite comedy
actors. He was
hilarious in
Dinner for Schmucks,
The 40 Year Old
Virgin,
Role
Models
and
I
Love You, Man.
Really, he’s been
hilarious in a
number of things,
even in cameos and
smaller roles. In
Our
Idiot Brother
he plays an
unmotivated stoner
and
perhaps the nicest
guy on Earth in Ned.
It’s a role that
Rudd plays capably
but it’s also a
movie that doesn’t
take full advantage
of what Rudd and a
great supporting
cast are capable of.
A few funny moments
are outweighed by a
lot of shortcomings
and even though you
can appreciate what
the movie tries to
do, it falls on its
face when you look
at the overall
picture.
Ned is the ultimate
nice guy. He puts
his faith in people
and trusts them
entirely, perhaps
even when he’s given
a reason not to.
This comes back to
bite him in the ass
time and time again.
Especially when a
uniformed police
officer asks him for
some marijuana and
Ned sells it to him.
Of course the
uniformed police
officer promptly
arrests him and Ned
goes to jail. After
a few months in
prison, Ned gets out
and he no longer has
a place to live and
his ex-girlfriend
won’t give him his
dog back. Distraught
and without a place
to stay, Ned stays
with his mom, grows
weary of that, then
starts staying with
his three different
sisters leaving a
wake of disaster
behind him
everywhere he goes.
His three sisters
blame Ned for
everything that
happens, but as it
turns out, Ned has
the purest of hearts
and he’s helping
them far more than
he’s hurting them.
They just don’t want
to see what’s wrong
with their lives and
they want someone to
blame when things go
wrong.
There
should be plenty of
hilarious moments
when there’s a cast
that includes Paul
Rudd, T.J. Miller,
Zooey Deschanel,
Elizabeth Banks,
Steve Coogan, and
Rashida Jones, but
that doesn’t happen
as much as you think
it would in
Our
Idiot Brother.
Instead we get a few
funny moments that
are spaced out every
ten or fifteen
minutes and none of
them have
belly-laughing
qualities. Instead
what we get are
several odd moments
and the hero in our
story getting walked
on by everyone in
sight for an hour
and a half.
As far as bonus
features go, there’s
not a lot to be had
with this release.
There’s an audio
commentary with
director Jesse
Peretz, a few
deleted scenes, and
a fifteen minute
making-of featurette.
Our
Idiot Brother
isn’t a bad comedy.
Paul Rudd is good as
he usually is and a
tremendous cast
around him makes the
movie extremely
watchable. It does
have more than a few
things wrong with
it, mainly it’s not
nearly as funny as
it could have been.
It’s not a bad
movie, but the
reality of it
is…
it falls way short
of it’s potential.
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