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DUMB AND DUMBER TO: 3 STARS. “some astoundingly unPC gags.”

article-2442727-187FED8900000578-1_634x495Twenty years ago, in a simpler and sillier time, “Dumb and Dumber’s” Harry Dunne (Jeff Daniels) shrieked at Lloyd Christmas (Jim Carrey), “Just when I thought you couldn’t possibly be any dumber, you go and do something like this… and totally redeem yourself!”

It’s a line that echoes through the sequel, “Dumb and Dumber To.” Can the Farrelly Brothers find redemption after a string of flops by resurrecting their most famous characters and out dumb and out funny the modern sultans of silly, Seth McFarlane and Judd Apatow?

The new film begins in present day. Lloyd has spent two decades at a Baldy View Psychiatric Hospital, traumatized by the loss of his love Mary Swanson. Or is he traumatized? On one of his weekly visits Harry discovers Lloyd has been faking his comatose state for twenty years as a gag. “That’s awesome,” he says. “I feel for it hook, line and sphincter.” Reunited, they hit the road, this time in search of a daughter (Rachel Melvin) Harry never knew he had. She’s the “fruit of his loom” but could also be the kidney donor he needs to save his life.

The experience of watching “Dumb and Dumber To” is like spending the weekend with your hamster brained nephews. It’s super fun to see tem when they first arrive, but by Saturday night their antics have started to grow thin. By Sunday you’re wondering how you can miss them if they won’t go away.

Twenty years later Harry and Lloyd haven’t gotten any wiser but they haven’t gotten much funnier either. There are some astoundingly unPC gags—and I mean that literally—here, but none that reach the otherworldly vulgarity of the original’s laxative overdose scene. Instead it’s wall-to-wall jokes and one-liners, some hit, most don’t and nothing, save for the “Did you hide them in this turkey?” scene reach the level of McFarlane or Apatow outrageousness.

Carrey, however, is on overdrive. When he isn’t flailing about he’s mouthing malapropisms like, “That’s water under the fridge,” and what the material lacks in actual funny lines, Carrey makes up in sheer enthusiasm. For his part, Daniels leaves the dignity of “The Newsroom” behind, showing his behind more times than is comfortable for anyone.

“Dumb and Dumber To” is predictably silly, amiable stuff, which, I suppose, explains why it isn’t called “Dumb and Dumber Quantum Entanglement.”


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