Anyone in the mood for a ramble through the cinematic junkyard is directed to this broken-down jalopy of a movie, a crass, mindless farce about two horny, dimwitted stoners attempting to reconstruct their wild experiences of the previous night–of which, as a result of ingesting a few substances too many, they’re now blissfully oblivious. Their ultimate goal is to retrieve their car, the location of which they can’t recall, because it’s filled with gifts for their girlfriends that they have to find if they’re to have any hope of salvaging their relationships; the search involves them with space aliens, a bunch of geeks who want to travel to the stars, a pot-smoking pooch, a transvestite stripper who’s stolen a large cache of cash, a bevy of outer-space chicks in tight leather suits, some Keystone Kops, a mad ostrich farmer, a couple of Schwarzenegger wannabes, a fifty-foot tall vixen, and–inevitably–a gang of surfer-type dunderheads who want to bash our heroes to smithereens. The cast of characters is, to say the least, varied. A pity it’s not also funny.
The doltish duo, Jesse and Chester, are played with blank-eyed enthusiasm by Ashton Kutcher (who simply repeats the dumb schtick he regularly employs on “The 70s Show,” one of whose writers is culpable for this script) and Seann William Scott, who previously graced “American Pie” and “Final Destination” and does little more than smile idiotically for eighty minutes here. (The running-time, at least, is extra-short, though it’s unconscionably extended by a series of pathetic out-takes over the closing credits.) One doesn’t want to waste too much time discussing their comic limitations; suffice it to say that they make “Bill and Ted” co-stars Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter look like Laurence Olivier and John Gielgud.
As for the rest of this lamentably smarmy and frantic teen sex flick, we may pass by in discreet silence the details of Philip Stark’s crude screenplay, filled with endless lame vulgarities; Danny Leiner’s frenetic direction, which milks the supposedly outrageous series of episodes so mercilessly that a junior-high talent show would play far more subtly; and the hapless turns by attractive Jennifer Garner, Marla Sokoloff and Kristy Swanson in supporting roles. (Just to give some idea of the quality of the humor, Ms. Swanson plays a sexy girl named Christie Boner.) One can merely express the hope that all of them will find happier outlets for their abilities in the future.
Not even the addition of a Third Stooge, which was probably beyond the meagre budget afforded by the studio, could have helped this dismal, mirthless clunker of a movie, the like of which really hasn’t been seen since the heyday of the American International cheapies of the late 1950s. Directly to the auto-crusher, please.