Caught the Zack Ephron / Robert De Niro raunchy comedy Dirty Grandpa today and, boy, was that a long 100 minute movie. Just tedious and kind of repetitive and completely predictable. And not as outrageous as they think it is because of bad casting. Putting De Niro in as a foul-mouthed, dirty old man assumes we’re surprised to see De Niro as a foul-mouthed, dirty old man. You want this character to work, you need more Tom Hanks and less De Niro. Probably would have helped having Ephron’s buttoned-down stiff of a character back before Ephron had already played a party guy in his last two or three movies.
But bad casting aside, this is a pretty mediocre comedy that pretty much trades on “can you believe he said that?” type humor. there are a couple good bits like a drug dealer and the really cool about it cops, I guess. The movie isn’t a complete disaster, just mostly a disaster. Unless you just whole-heartedly find De Niro saying naughty things to college students, black people, gay people, etc… in which case, it’s a hoot. Wilford Brimley saying these things = funny (maybe).
Also doesn’t help the movie is utterly predictable… will dirty grandpa convince uptight grandson to not marry the unfun shrew-like fiance and get with the fun and eco-friendly college girl? Have you ever seen a movie?
Score: 64