Review

Grade D, as in dumbest

Stupid humor can be smartly done, as the Farrelly brothers proved with a string of hilarious films, including 1994's Dumb and Dumber. The non-Farrelly prequel to that movie, Dumb and Dumberer: When Harry Met Lloyd, shows what happens when a brain isn't engaged to create crude comedy.

Aside from Eric Christian Olsen and Derek Richardson's uncanny impersonations of Dumb and Dumber co-stars Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels, this movie doesn't have anything going for it.

The idea, because Carrey and Daniels weren't interested in another D&D movie, was to go back to the origins of that previously hilarious duo: a 1986 high school run-in (literally) explaining the chipped tooth Carrey displayed. Director and co-writer Troy Miller grabs our attention with the opening shot, a Harry's-eye view of his birth. But he doesn't create the story - and worse, the smart lunacy - the aping actors deserve.

Case in point: Because Daniels presented a memorably gross bathroom scene in the first movie, so does Richardson as the younger version of Harry, clumsily smearing a melted chocolate bar all over a bathroom so it looks like something else. The shocked look on the homeowner's face isn't worth the protracted setup. And didn't Caddyshack close the book on candy bar grossness?

The Farrellys showed how crude gags can be smart when Carrey and Daniels rode a motorcycle in freezing weather and Lloyd, um, relieved himself on Harry's back. Same kind of bodily function gag, but the Farrellys took it a step further over the edge by having Lloyd frozen onto Harry's back when they got off the motorcycle. Make us think a little before we groan, that's all we ask.

Where the first movie had a sweet love story at its center, Dumb and Dumberer settles into a Porky's-style conflict between the dimwitted heroes and a corrupt principal (Eugene Levy with little to do) and his paramour lunch lady (Cheri Oteri with even less). Mimi Rogers shows up as Harry's mother and Lloyd's fantasy. An intrepid journalism student (Rachel Nichols) is a dumbed-down version of the Bernstein-Woodward cliche, snooping around the bogus "special needs" class, starring Harry and Lloyd, arranged by the principal to embezzle a $100,000 grant.

Olsen's impeccable Carrey mannerisms and know-it-all wisecracks and Miller's occasional flashes of inspiration could make the movie a guilty video pleasure, like Dude, Where's My Car? That's a long step down from joining a minor classic like Dumb and Dumber.

Grade: D+

Director: Troy Miller

Cast: Eric Christian Olsen, Derek Richardson, Eugene Levy, Cheri Oteri, Luis Guzman, Mimi Rogers, Rachel Nichols

Screenplay: Troy Miller, Robert Brenner, based on characters created by Peter Farrelly, Bobby Farrelly and Bennett Yellin

Rating: PG-13; crude humor, sexual situations, profanity

Running time: 88 min.

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