Dude, Where's My Car? [Blu-ray]
Blu-ray A - America - Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment
Review written by and copyright: Pat Pilon (9th October 2008).
The Film

Imagine waking up in the morning and not remembering the night before. Now, this may not seem to be all that uncommon, but imagine learning throughout the day that the night before was the wildest night you've ever had. This is the backstory for this movie. Jesse (Ashton Kutcher) and Chester (Seann William Scott) wake up in the morning, and discover their car is missing. They go on a quest to find their missing vehicle.

'Quest' is definitely the right work, indeed, as they get whisked about from place to place, situation to situation, talking to various people, attempting to reconstruct the previous night. They have to find their car, because, as it happens, the anniversary gifts they got for their girlfriends are perhaps in the car. In their travels, they have to deal with a strange cult, some hot chicks in black spandex, some Scandinavian guys in leather, a transsexual stripper, some ostriches, and the hottest chick in the world's boyfriend and his gang. Oh, and other stuff happens.

These guys are so infinitely moronic, they could 'Sweet' and 'Dude' their way into next week without even thinking twice. They make Harold and Lloyd look like Rhodes scholars. It's really a terrific choice in casting to get these two actors, who have made their careers in playing compete dolts. The movie, and the characters, get more and more ludicrous as the seconds tick on.

However, even if the movie having such stupid characters and such a stupid plot, that doesn't mean the movie is dumb. The creators knew the movie would be stupid, and the actors, though playing utter idiots, make very nice decisions. They don't really care about any kind of credibility, dignity or realism. The plot meanders in the way your imagination does in the few minutes before you go to sleep. Nothing is off limits or beyond the realm of possibility in this movie. As a perfect example of this, the funniest scene happens when Jesse and Chester try to out-machismo Fabio at red light. That particular moment shows the fun attitude that went into making the movie.

Amid all of these, there's some strong on-screen talent lending themselves to this nonsense. In addition to the two stars, Marla Sokoloff, Hal Sparks, Andy Dick, Kristy Swanson and Jennifer Garner. They don't do too much other than add some goofiness to everything.

The jokes require any kind of brain activity, but the movie is particularly unpredictable. Anybody judging the movie harshly has the brain the size of a lugnut because the doesn't try to achieve much. I really enjoyed this, and recommend it to anybody who wants to laugh, but who don’t want to remember what they were laughing about in the morning.

Video

1.85:1 widescreen, using the MPEG-2 codec. The picture is fine, and there's nothing particularly wrong with what's on screen. The colours are vibrant in the way they should be. The contrast is also very good, giving the picture nice brightness and accuracy. The picture doesn't exhibit too much three-dimentionality, and is slightly soft, not really being as detailed as it could be. Compression is good and there's no problem with ringing, or artifacting. The picture is good, though this is a strange choice for a high-def release.

Audio

The main track is an English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track, but there are French and Spanish dubs in Dolby Digital 5.1. The movie is very active from beginning to end, though not in the same way as, say, 'Transformers'. There's always something going on around these two clowns, and the track follows along pretty nicely with whatever outdoor or indoor sounds are appropriate to the situation. Dialogue is always clear, and the music is always loud and clear, with nice bass. However, the distinction between sounds isn't too big, and the dynamic range ends up being a bit flat. However, for this type of movie, I doubt it should be too much of a concern.
English, Spanish, Cantonese and Korean subtitles are there.

Extras

I'd heard good things about the commentary from the original DVD release, but, alas, this being a catalogue release from Fox, there's no such extra on this disc. The only thing you'll find are Trailers for 'Dude, Where’s My Car?' (2:22), 'Alien vs. Predator' (2:17), 'Dodgeball' (2:26) and 'X-Men: The Last Stand' (2:26)

Overall

The Film: B Video: B Audio: B- Extras: F Overall: C

 


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