Step Brothers (2008)
Directed by Adam McKay
Brennan Huff and Dale Doback might be grown men. But that doesn't stop them from living at home and turning into jealous, competitive stepbrothers when their single parents marry. Brennan's constant competition with Dale strains his mom's marriage to Dale's dad, leaving everyone to wonder whether they'll ever see eye to eye.
20 connections found
View:
20 films that influenced Step Brothers
What critics say influenced Step Brothers
If the idea of watching two grown men act like children - oversize, shouting, stomping, mouth-full-of- Cheez Whiz 12-year-olds - was actually comedy gold, Tom Hanks would be on his fourth "Big" sequel by now and Judge Reinhold would have rode a "Vice Versa" train all the way to retirement.
Picture Tom Hanks in a de-cornified “Big”: Wouldn’t his first move have been a mission for porn and beer?
Credit Ferrell and Reilly for most of them, as they not only commit to the material but really give these adult children a kind of plausibility (one day this will make a good triple feature with "Big," and "13 Going on 30.").
Extensive mention and onscreen presence of lots of brands and TV shows and movies, including Diet Pepsi, Mountain Dew, Heinz ketchup, Converse sneakers, Enterprise Rent-a-Car, Belkin movers, Pet Smart, Outback Steak House, Hustler Magazine, The Cheesecake Factory, Hulk Hands toys, Sony Vaio, Doritos, Good Housekeeping, The Outsiders , Scarface , Good Will Hunting , Rock of Love , The Apprentice , Star Wars , Guitar Hero , "Shark Week," American Idol , and more.
These are indulgent parents but their boys are the monsters that ate Star Wars: full-grown men with the socialisation of lazy 13-year-old brats.
Brennan lounges around in his Star Wars pajamas and threatens to punch Dale in the face while he sleeps.
Dressed in worn "Star Wars" tees, they cherish their samurai swords and drum kits, happily sponging off the parents who have spent the last quarter-century searching for the right way to shove them out of the nest.
If the idea of watching two grown men act like children - oversize, shouting, stomping, mouth-full-of- Cheez Whiz 12-year-olds - was actually comedy gold, Tom Hanks would be on his fourth "Big" sequel by now and Judge Reinhold would have rode a "Vice Versa" train all the way to retirement.
A piece of male anatomy that Ben Stiller made famous in "There's Something About Mary" gets a return close-up here.
When Brennan runs to rub his testicles on Dale’s drum set, it generates the same howls of laughter that "There’s Something About Mary" induced in young audiences unprepared for its similar visual gag of naughty bits.
Advertisement
How could the industry that produced Bringing Up Baby, Some Like It Hot and Raising Arizona have found its way to Step Brothers - a movie that's equal parts foul air and dead air, a sort of extended improvisation session by two guys who think that scratching their testicles is a punchline?
The irony should not be lost on the fact that David Fincher's Mank, a dramatized feature about the writing of one of Orson Welles's greatest films, Citizen Kane (1941), is being released by the streaming giant Netflix.
With its middle-age roommates failing to meet basic developmental milestones, “Step Brothers” is like “Wayne’s World” and “The Odd Couple” taking a shower together, under a soothing cascade of filthy language.
That guy from “Torque” and “The Return.”
Advertisement
The story of two overgrown adolescents who become sudden kin when their single parents marry, it's "The 40-Year-Old Virgin" with two 40-year-old virgins, "Knocked Up" without the knocking up.
When Robert and ... Rating: R for crude and sexual content, and pervasive language Length: 95 minutes Released: July 25, 2008 Nationwide Cast: Will Ferrell, John C. Reilly, Mary Steenburgen, Richard Jenkins, Adam Scott Director: Adam McKay More info and showtimes » "Step Brothers" knocks "Drillbit Taylor" from its perch as the worst film yet from the once infallible Apatow Productions comedy assembly line ("Knocked Up," "The 40-Year-Old Virgin").
Produced by Judd Apatow ( The 40-Year-Old Virgin , Knocked Up ), Step Brothers has the raunchy rawness of his other comedies, but none of the sweetness or structure.
It doesn't rank high in the lowbrow-comedy genre that has produced legitimately smart entries such as "The 40-Year-Old Virgin" or "Knocked Up" (both directed by Apatow), but it does succeed as a token contender by delivering real laughs at the expense of intelligence and decency.
"Step Brothers" knocks "Drillbit Taylor" from its perch as the worst film yet from the once infallible Apatow Productions comedy assembly line ("Knocked Up," "The 40-Year-Old Virgin").
Step Brothers and the forthcoming Pineapple Express, in fact, represent the Apatow factory’s seventh and eight films in just the past 12 months, and their fourth and fifth in just the first seven months of 2008—an output that would be entirely unobjectionable if even a small fraction were on par with The 40-Year Old Virgin or Knocked Up (as it happens, the only two entries actually directed by Apatow).
Produced by Judd Apatow ( The 40-Year-Old Virgin , Knocked Up ), Step Brothers has the raunchy rawness of his other comedies, but none of the sweetness or structure.
Will Ferrell isn't yet as irrelevant as Mike "The Love Guru" Myers, but it's telling that when Seth Rogen makes a brief cameo appearance in "Step Brothers," the "Knocked Up" actor seems to be doing the much more famous Ferrell a favor.
Adam Scott, the smarmy male nurse from "Knocked Up," is just as funny and obnoxious as Brennan's over-achieving younger brother, the perfect foil that constantly makes Brennan look bad, as is Kathryn Hahn as his sex-starved wife who takes a creepy fancy to Dale.
Costars Adam Scott (Knocked Up, Tell Me You Love Me) and Kathryn Hahn (The Last Mimzy, The Holiday) are absolutely hilarious as Brennan's impossibly weenie-esque brother and his impossibly-repressed, half-crazed wife.
Producer Judd Apatow (Knocked Up, Superbad).
(Their bonding scene is set to Hall and Oates’ “You Make My Dreams Come True,” which performed a similar function in Dumb and Dumberer: When Harry Met Lloyd (2003).