Perhaps it’s the cynic in me. Does anybody else feel this way? Does anybody out there think that Ron Howard simply makes movies to give brother Clint something to do? You know, Clint is lying on the sofa, watchin’ cable and shopping networks all day. Opie comes home tired, gets a disgusted look on his face and says, “it’s time to make another movie.” Clint gets all excited and does chores for a week.
Me? I think I’m going to write a Vince Vaughn script. Lemme see if I got all the elements down:
First we show Vince loud and chummy at an event of some kind, preferably sports. He’s happy; he’s a pal. He’s always a pal. Then we show his character flaws, especially the immaturity. Then he makes a really bad move and gets beaten up. In trying to figure out why he got beaten up, we have him make several more bad moves, thus alienating all the friends he had. Then he gets beat up again. Now here’s the key part – at some point, Vince has to make an impressively awkward speech in which he shows exactly how at odds he is 
with the rest of the people in the film. The speech has to show not only how out-of-touch Vince is with his companions, it also has to show how out-of-touch the screen writer is with this concept I like to call “humor”. Then after 90 minutes or so, all issues are magically resolved and all character flaws magically gone. Did I miss anything?
The Dilemma is standard VV formula. Nick (Kevin James) is being cuckolded. His hot wife, Geneva (Winona Ryder), is fooling around with Channing Tatum. Is this like a Twins thing? Do we want to compare Kevin James and Channing Tatum? I’m not sure what the point of that exercise is. Does it really matter who Nick‘s wife is bonking? We the audience take in all that and then we understand this is Vince Vaughn’s story.
Excuse me?
Yeah, that’s right; somehow, Vince Vaughn appearing in a film means the film is about Vince Vaughn no matter how tenuous the tie to honest human conflict he is. Here, Vince takes it upon himself to investigate the infidelity of Geneva and then, his Dilemma, whether or not to tell best friend Nick. Naturally, this leads to Vince battling the twin horrors of poisonous flora and interaction with Clint Howard (it’s unclear which is the worse). Then Vince has a street brawl with Tatum. I wouldn’t do that after watching Fighting; Tatum kinda kicks ass.
Anybody want to explore a clear reason why this film was made? Nothing quite like milking the humor of infidelity. Or maybe we just like it when Queen Latifah claims to have “Lady Wood.” Glad somebody was capable of being excited by this project.
Rated PG-13, 111 Minutes
D: Ron Howard
W: Allan Loeb
Genre: Vince Vaughn fu
Type of person most likely to enjoy this film: People who get a kick out of ID’ing Clint Howard in Ron Howard films
Type of person least likely to enjoy this film: People who identify with Kevin James, I suppose
