Harold and Kumar Make Another Movie
So. Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay. Spoilers ahead, so take note.
I liked Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle. It was much funnier than I had any expectation of it being. It was completely absurd, took some fascinatingly insane turns, and had a satisfying ending. Of course, Neil Patrick Harris stole the fucking movie with his two brief appearances, which are already the stuff of legend. The man is a god.
So while the first one wasn’t anything genius, it was a lot of fun, and I wouldn’t say I had high hopes for this second one, but the previews were promising, and NPH was in it again, so I figured it would be a pretty decent flick. It was not. Sure, it has its moments. NPH is, once again, the best part in the flick, hands down. The scene near the end with George W. Bush is also pretty funny in a ‘wow, so this is happening now’ sort of way. Seeing Harold in a flashback with ridiculous emo hair was hilarious. There are a handful of cheerfully absurd moments that keep it from being a bad movie, but not enough to make it a really good one.
The trouble is this is a preachy, preachy fucking movie. On and on about stereotyping, treatment of suspects, and narcotics laws, you know, in between stupid bodily function gags. Other than a moment that was in the trailer, there really isn’t a laugh in the first twenty minutes or so. It just felt excessive, it reminded me of There’s Something About Mary a lot of the time. Ooo-er aren’t we risky bits. Rob Corddry is funny for a couple minutes then progressively more irritating for the rest. He’s the world’s biggest racist and he works for the government. I get it. It’s supposed to be satire, but it’s more heavy-handed about it than a Michael Bay movie.
Like I said, it’s not a bad movie, just not exactly a good one either. Still, I was more interested in the trailer for Pineapple Express, which looks like a seriously fucked-up movie, and The Strangers (trailer) looks scary as hell.
pineapple express and the strangers do look like a good time.
I clearly liked H&KII more than you did. Can’t say I truly noticed the movie being any more preachy about racism and such than the first movie was. Honestly, the gags about racism felt like more of the same from the first film to me, which I was fine with.
I agree with the Cordry assessment, his gag wore thin very quickly. NPH was definitely the best part of the movie though, hands down.
The most upsetting thing about Pineapple Express is that the song in the trailer is by MIA and now I’m forced to realize that I do actually like a song by MIA.
Anyway.
NPH ruled and Corddry was unfortunately awful (a shame because I always enjoyed him on The Daily Show), that we can all agree on.
I think the racism jokes this time around just felt more… pushy. I can’t explain how exactly. It felt grating. Especially around Corddry’s character, but not exclusive to. Some scenes just felt like lesser retreads of scenes in the first one too, like the scene at the urban hillbilly sibling couple’s house, which seemed an awful lot like when they stay at the hairy mutant guy with the gorgeous wife’s house in the first one. Mind you, none of that would bother me so much if the movie had just been more consistently funny and entertaining. Most of the time I just felt like I was counting grains of sand.