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You should get up and run if you see Without a Paddle coming your way.
Continuing to prove he's as inconsequential as a shortstop making actual
physical contact with second base while he's turning a double-play, director
Steven Brill (Mr. Deeds) again flounders without a Sandler-like talent in
front of his camera. The film is about three D.B. Cooper-obsessed Gen Xers
who, upon the death of a friend, decide to have themselves a little
adventure on and around the Spirit River in Oregon. Dan (Seth Green), Jerry
(Matthew Lillard) and Tom (Dax Shepard) were childhood best friend who have
each taken different paths in terms of career (doctor, corporate whore,
sextician) and sociological quirks (uptight, compulsive liar,
commitment-phobic). But like my old Aunt Asshole used to say, there's
nothing like a canoe trip to rekindle a friendship.
Before long, our triptych of heroes are having all sorts of trouble with the
dreaded Three Ns of Whitewater Rafting Trips (nature, navigation, and Ned
Beatty fuckers), proving that people who take these kinds of vacations also
deserve to be shark snacks. Paddle can't decide whether it wants to be a
slapstick-y, gross-out comedy, or a heartfelt Stand By Me-meets-Deliverance
drama. And it ends up being neither. Still, you have to give mad props to
a company (Viacom) that uses its television network (CBS) to force the
contestants of its big reality show (Big Brother) to watch their smelly
August release and praise it like feet don't fail me now. That would be
like a concentration camp agreeing, as a whole, that the moldy bread is
deliciously fantastic (as opposed to, like, no bread).
========== X-RAMR-ID: 38494 X-Language: en X-RT-ReviewID: 1311201 X-RT-TitleID: 1134891 X-RT-SourceID: 595 X-RT-AuthorID: 1146 X-RT-RatingText: 3/10
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