Hall Pass

It’s 2011, and this is my first review of the new year. The reason for that is this is the time of year when the studios dump all the shit they know nobodies going to go see. But how could I resist a Farrelly brothers’ movie? The men that made “Dumb and Dumber,” “Kingpin,” and “There’s something about Mary” couldn’t have made a film worthy of such a terrible release date. I guess I must have blocked out “Heartbreak Kid” from my memory, one of the worst comedies I’ve ever seen.

So how does “Hall Pass” stack up? The film is about two guys who are given one week off of marriage, and features their misadventures as they try to get laid. I will say that this movie is above and beyond the “Heartbreak Kid” (did I mention it’s one of the worst movies I’ve ever seen?), but overall it’s mediocre. The way I judge comedies is really simple: laughs. When I walk into a comedy I don’t have the same expectations as a drama in terms of directing and acting and such. Even the story doesn’t have to make sense as long as it’s believable and somewhat logical. But the one thing a comedy is worthless without is the actual comedy. This movie had a fun way of treating the subject matter, and thoroughly explored all the possibilities. And the ending was predictable but who cares if the whole movie was predictable as long as it’s funny. I would say there were two or three good jokes in this movie, tops.

It’s not the actors’ faults; as far as I’m concerned Jason Sudeikis and Christina Applegate are top shelf comedic actors. And the whole cast was trying there damnedest, but they can only make the shitty jokes in the script so funny. Just a note for the Farrelly’s: Jenna Fischer is super hot, why would you insist on ugly-ing her up in every damn scene????? Did the makeup lady take the week off??? She looked like she had jaundice half the time. Not to mention that Stephen Merchant and J B Smoove are two of the funniest humans in existence and they are completely under utilized in this movie, in fact I’m not entirely sure they were in it at all. The biggest complaint with the film is it takes entirely too long to get going. The film has major pacing problems, and major script problems. At one point I was thinking: there is no way the Farrelly’s, experienced directors, were not aware that the jokes weren’t working during the filming of the movie. The fact that they didn’t try and fix it is a sign of laziness or apathy or ignorance. So to sum it up, not bad but not good either. Wait and rent it on Netflix or something.