REVIEW: Biggest Surprise In ‘Role Models’ Is Its Nonstop Laughs

If audience laughter is the best barometer of a comedic film, then “Role Models” is a winner.
This unsung little movie is raunchy but not in a gratuitous way. Amid the hilarity, it even manages to come off as sweet.
Co-writer Paul Rudd (“The 40 Year Old Virgin”) and Seann Michael Scott (the “America Pie” movies) star as two pitchmen – Danny and Wheeler – for an energy drink called Minotaur. While Danny does most of the talking, Wheeler dresses in a ridiculous costume as a minotaur, a mythological monster with the head of a bull. The duo travels from high school to high school touting the high-octane energy drink as an alternative to drugs.
Following an “incident,” the two choose community service over jail time and are assigned to spend 150 hours in a Big Brothers-type program for troubled children. Danny draws Augie (Christopher Mintz-Plasse), a nerdy teen who wears a cape and wields a plastic sword and is obsessed with a medieval role-playing game. Wheeler gets Ronnie (newcomer Bobb’e J. Thompson), a potty-mouthed pre-teen with the comedic timing that would rival any standup comedian’s.
“Role Models” succeeds in spite of itself – a formulaic plot with few surprises but one that packs in nonstop laughs during its 99-minute running time. The ensemble cast also features two other alums from “The 40 Year Old Virgin,” the hilarious Jane Lynch as Gayle Sweeny, a former drug addict who heads the mentoring program, and Danny’s girlfriend Beth (Elizabeth Banks).
Some of the best laughs are one-liners from the little boy Ronnie, who could have made Richard Pryor blush. A black kid, he likes to refer to his mentor’s friend, Danny, as Ben Affleck.
Here’s one exchange:
Ronnie: “Suck it, ‘Reindeer Games!’ “
Danny: “I’m not Ben Affleck.”
Ronnie: “You white, then you Ben Affleck.”
Danny plays the disaffected 30-something to perfection. He hates his life – and that’s before he gets stuck in community service and a bizarre world where teenagers and adult men are obsessed with a Dungeons and Dragons type war game, where a tap with a toy sword means you’re dead.
Beth, the best part of Danny’s life, is a lawyer who dumps him after he verbally abuses a coffeehouse waitress:
Danny: “Can I get a large black coffee?”    Waitress: “A what?”    Danny: “Large black coffee.”    Waitress: “Do you mean a venti?”    Danny: “No, I mean a large.”    Waitress: “Venti is large.”    Danny: “No venti is twenty. Large is large. In fact tall is large and grande is Spanish for large. Venti is the only one that doesn’t mean large. It’s also the only one that’s Italian. Congratulations you’re stupid in three languages.”  Waitress: “A venti is a large coffee.”    Danny: “Really says who: Fellini? Do you accept lira or is it all euros now?”
That’s the most dialogue from “Role Models” that can be printed in a family newspaper.
In the end, Danny and Wheeler find redemption by turning their immaturity into compassion. It’s the typical happy ending required of movies such as this, but the film’s laugh-out-loud moments, and there are many, are worth the formulaic ride.

‘ROLE MODELS’ is rated R for graphic language and is showing at Tinseltown in Bristol, Va., and Cinemall in Abingdon, Va.

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