Dumb and Dumber To
Dir. Bobby & Peter Farrelly
In second grade, I got in trouble for proclaiming at room volume: “who’s got the
wiener schnitzel?” Some girl told the teacher thinking I meant something else,
but my young mind only absorbed that line from the funniest movie ever made, Dumb and Dumber. It’s a film I return to
over and over again, and remains my all-time favorite movie. When I was but a
wee boy, my mom received a VHS double-pack of The Mask and Dumb and Dumber for
her birthday. After coercing her to let me watch a PG-13 movie, I would play them so often the video became unwatchably degraded.
To this day, I can still recite large chunks of the movie word-for-word, and it
no doubt shaped my sense of humor growing up (which inevitably led me on the
path to trying stand-up in my undergrad years). It’s a film that means a lot to
me, but through the years, it seems like the powers that be in Hollywood want to take that magic away.
First was the god awful prequel Dumb and Dumberer: When Harry Met Lloyd, starring two younger
actors doing their best Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels impressions, which was the
comedy equivalent of watching a close family member succumb to a deadly skin
disease. Then came the “unrated” DVD and Blu-Ray re-release. Unless you scour
the internet, the only version you can currently buy is this shitty, re-cut
version which literally takes out some of the best scenes and ruins some of the
funniest moments by adding unnecessary comic beats. So when it was announced
just over a year ago that Jim and Jeff would be returning, a full 20 years
later, to film Dumb and Dumber To, it
seemed like such a cynical cash grab from the Farrelly Brothers.
Both Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels just weren’t the same
people anymore. Jeff was off doing respectable work like The Newsroom, and Jim
Carrey’s stardom had taken a major toll on him – he was depressed, on meds, writing
existential children’s books, and going on whacked out “spiritual journeys.” Like
Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, it just
seemed their youthful energy would be channeled into forced “old guy” humor to
justify this desperate money-making scheme. And looking at the output of the Farrelly Brothers recently - The Three Stooges, Hall Pass, and The Heartbreak Kid - was hardly promising. But here we are anyway, and out of obligation, I lined up
and bought my ticket to promised disappointment. After seeing the film however,
I have to say, it was a blindsidingly fun (but still unnecessary) swan song to
put an end to things.
