Not as terrible as I had suspected, but still a lousy, straight-faced excuse for a comedy

Rating: 4/10 (12 September 2009)

In Mike Myers' career as a comedian, he has had a lot of success, with "Saturday Night Live" sketches, the two Wayne's World movies, the Austin Powers trilogy, and the voice of the popular computer animated character, Shrek. However, there have also been low points in his career, most notably his starring role in the poor full-length adaptation of Dr. Seuss' "The Cat in the Hat", from 2003, and this 2008 flop, "The Love Guru". Unlike "The Cat in the Hat", Myers not only starred in this film, he was also a writer for it, just like he was with the Wayne's World and Austin Powers movies. Unlike the comedian's previous full-length writing efforts, this one isn't funny. I thought it would be worse, judging by how much criticism it had received, but like most people, I didn't laugh.
Maurice Pitka was born in America but raised in India, in the village of Harenmahkeester. At the age of twelve, he was given a chastity belt by Guru Tugginmypudha, forced to wear it until he found love in himself. He is now a guru, still wearing the belt, and dreaming of being the #1 guru and appearing on the "The Oprah Winfrey Show". He is called over to Toronto, Ontario, Canada by widely despised Toronto Maple Leafs owner Jane Bullard, to help Darren Roanoke, one of the hockey team's players. Roanoke has been troubled since his wife, Prudence, left him for French Canadian Los Angeles Kings goalie Jacques Grandé, which has been affecting his performance. Guru Pitka's job is to help the Leafs player with his troubles so he will play hockey as well as he used to. He attempts to get Roanoke back with his wife and get the troubled Leafs player to stand up to his aggressive mother.
Before I watched this comedy flop, I knew it was widely abhorred for its immature potty humour. While the lame gross-out humour isn't as extreme or consistent as I expected, you can be sure it's still there. There's more than one booger joke, plus excretion gags, such as an elephant defecating, the flashback with the "stink mop" (a mop soaked in urine) used for fight training, and Guru Pitka making diarrhea noises. In addition to the bathroom jokes, there are also very juvenile sex jokes, including elephant sex on the hockey rink! In addition to the crude physical gags, there are also verbal ones, which also happen to be weak. Many modern comedies show that sex and toilet humour can really be funny, but "The Love Guru" is one of many other modern comedies that show this kind of humour can also be really lame. Not only is Myers not funny in this movie, neither is Stephen Colbert as sex-crazed stoner hockey announcer Jay Kell, or anyone else in the cast who may try to be funny. After seeing the film, I'm also convinced that pop sensation Justin Timberlake, who plays Jacques Grandé here, can't act, which doesn't help the fact that I don't respect him as a singer, either.
All the hatred for this movie made me think that maybe Mike Myers had sunk to the level of Tom Green, another comedian from my country, but a much less talented one. Fortunately, it turns out he hasn't, but he's still going to have to come up with something funnier than this if he wants to recover his career. While watching "The Love Guru", I didn't laugh at all, and don't think I even smiled, even if there were parts where I came close, whether that was a good thing or not. I guess it takes a lot for a movie to REALLY disgust me, but I think I've made it clear that I'm still not impressed with this particular comedy. I'm not sure if it was worthy of beating "Meet the Spartans" and "Disaster Movie" at the Razzies (I haven't seen either of those films, but seeing Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer's previous project, "Epic Movie", was enough to tell me that the duo just might know the definition of unfunny better than anyone else in the history of comedy), but coming from a comedian who has talent, I'm sure this film has come as a shock to many people! If you love puerile adolescent humour, then maybe this film is for you. If not, then I suggest you skip it.