The title does not inspire confidence that the movie will have any redeeming value. The cast, on the other hand, includes some of my favorite actors, like Paul Rudd, Steve Coogan, and Zooey Deschanel. I put the movie in my queue because i was sure my kids would enjoy it--sophomoric humor in a movie that did not require one to engage their brain. It has some of those elements, but it includes a bit more.
I have been thinking a lot about sibships lately because my eldest son recently got married, and his brothers were all intimately involved in the preparations and the ceremony itself. So I am a little prone to defending the idiot brother just now, is all I am saying.
Ned (Paul Rudd) is a laid back guy who is a little naive. He sells marijuana to a uniformed police officer because the guy tells him he's had a hard day and he felt bad for him. He gets predictably arrested and goes to jail for 18 months. Upon his release he finds that his girlfriend is living with someone else and she doesn't want to give him back his dog, either. This is the last straw. Ned loves that dog.
Having no job and no roof over his head, he spends time living with each of his sisters throughout the movie. In each case he observes some sort of bad behavior in his sister or their significant other, and in his ever transparent manner, divulges information that ends up upsetting them. Ok, he is not the brightest bulb in the box. He spends zero time thinking through the consequences of his actions. But his sisters blame him for the news. They shoot the messenger. Which is far easier than looking at what they themselves have done. Ned has also proven himself incapable of keeping a secret or tactfully delivering bad news, so the fact they keep updating him on their bad behavior shows additional poor judgement. It is a very funny way to look at what has become a culturally pervasive coping strategy--externalization of blame. It wasn't my fault, it's our idiot brother's fault.
Saturday, July 14, 2012
Our Idiot Brother (2011)
The title does not inspire confidence that the movie will have any redeeming value. The cast, on the other hand, includes some of my favorite actors, like Paul Rudd, Steve Coogan, and Zooey Deschanel. I put the movie in my queue because i was sure my kids would enjoy it--sophomoric humor in a movie that did not require one to engage their brain. It has some of those elements, but it includes a bit more.
I have been thinking a lot about sibships lately because my eldest son recently got married, and his brothers were all intimately involved in the preparations and the ceremony itself. So I am a little prone to defending the idiot brother just now, is all I am saying.
Ned (Paul Rudd) is a laid back guy who is a little naive. He sells marijuana to a uniformed police officer because the guy tells him he's had a hard day and he felt bad for him. He gets predictably arrested and goes to jail for 18 months. Upon his release he finds that his girlfriend is living with someone else and she doesn't want to give him back his dog, either. This is the last straw. Ned loves that dog.
Having no job and no roof over his head, he spends time living with each of his sisters throughout the movie. In each case he observes some sort of bad behavior in his sister or their significant other, and in his ever transparent manner, divulges information that ends up upsetting them. Ok, he is not the brightest bulb in the box. He spends zero time thinking through the consequences of his actions. But his sisters blame him for the news. They shoot the messenger. Which is far easier than looking at what they themselves have done. Ned has also proven himself incapable of keeping a secret or tactfully delivering bad news, so the fact they keep updating him on their bad behavior shows additional poor judgement. It is a very funny way to look at what has become a culturally pervasive coping strategy--externalization of blame. It wasn't my fault, it's our idiot brother's fault.
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