Wednesday, April 2, 2008

DRILLBIT TAYLOR

“DRILLBIT TAYLOR” (Owen Wilson)

OK, it’s official; The Seth Rogen recycling of 3 dorky kids striving to become ‘cool’ has run its course – it’s over Seth. STOP NOW. I’m encouraging you, the movie viewer to help with this campaign by not going to see this turkey in the theatre or renting it when it comes out on DVD – trust me; you’ve seen this film before & with much funnier dialogue. ‘Drillbit Taylor’ plays like an idea that has not only run out of gas, but has stooped to using squeegies to clean windshields for beer money.
Owen Wilson brings nothing new to the table as the homeless title character that becomes a body guard-slash-mentor to 3 dweeby teens.
The kids are the same 3 you’ve seen before’ the skinny shy kid who has a crush on a girl who is out of his league – the chubby Seth Rogen look-alike who seems in a perpetual state of ‘hyper’ - & the uber-geek little squirt that no one would want to hang out with but proves his meddle in the end.
There are no laughs – a sprinkling of chuckles are about it – as most scenes are of un-humorous sight gags involving someone being punched. “We need to find out what it’s like to be hit in a fight so let’s beat each other up!”
The sub-plot of Drillbit’s homeless buddies robbing the house of one of the boys under his protective wing is actually kind of sad & pathetic. I know the idea is to provide a scenario so Drillbit can have his stereotypical ‘change of heart’ but it just simply doesn’t work The only true humorous moment does involve his homeless buddies as they take Drillbit’s scam of showing up at school with coffee cups in their hands & drawing a paycheck as a substitute teacher. But the rest of ‘Drillbit Taylor’ is been there/done that.

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