pretty sad

Rating: 3/10 (18 November 2002)

This kind of lame-brained comedy that is so cherished by the mass market must fill some kind of masochistic social need, but I personally don't get it. I loved and admired such dark comedies as "After Hours," "The Out of Towners" and even "Something About Mary," but they had something that this one lacked: intelligence and a sense of the unexpected. This script seemed to be written around Stiller & DeNiro, a series of gags and sketches that add up to a big rollicking nothing. This is very much in the "Home Alone" vein, written for adolescents who revel in unsubtle physical humor, much of it based in cruelty (S&M all the way) with a sickly sweet ending that was a foregone conclusion from the beginning.