Four childhood friends sit atop a tree house and discuss their future adventures. With their trusty Indiana Jones compass and treasure map they want to seek out some missing money in the wilds of Oregon (or the lost treasure of D.B. Cooper as it is referred to, sounding too similar to Copperpot and his treasure map from 'The Goonies' also set in Oregon). The 80's time frame is captured well with the foursome playing Ghostbusters and Indiana Jones , and Star Wars figures are the heroes of the hour. Time goes on and our kids are now thirty-somethings and four no more.
Dan (Seth Green - Austin Powers, Buffy ), Jerry (Matthew Lillard - Scooby Doo, Scream ) and Tom (Dax Shepard - Punk'd ) reunite at the funeral of their childhood friend, Billy. Upon a visit to the tree house from days gone past they find a box in which they kept their prized possessions and secrets. An Indiana Jones compass, a C3P0 , a rubber and a treasure map see the light of day again. Only there are more items in the box that what once was. Billy, it seemed, had planned the treasure hunt for real they had always dreamed about and all his efforts have been left for the remaining threesome.
It's time now for them to hit the wilds. New Zealand does not look like Oregon in any way but the jokes are still flung towards the greenest of States. The home of the 'suicide girls' and 'earth mamas' is recreated for our intrepid treasure seekers, the city boys are taken out of their environment and although time has passed their problems of old still seem true of today. Dan has a different phobia every day, Jerry can't seem to grow up and have commitments and Dax is still lulled by his supposed family’s bad luck.
During their trip, which starts off calmly but soon gets chaotic, they face river rapids, a broody bear, a redneck sheriff, dope farming hillbillies, hairy hippy chicks (who surprisingly still shave their armpits), a wild mountain man (Burt Reynolds) and the movie tries to wrap it all up cosily with an eco-message. With each little disaster our trio gets their clothing taken away bit by bit until we have some underpants in the woods being chased by burly men shenanigans (at one point Seth Green's Dr. Mott even says a line straight out of 'Deliverance' ). Then it plays the coming-of-age-this-is-what-friendship-is-really-about-card.
Enough said.
What is wrong with this movie is that you get the feeling that the stars held back far too much. This is made even more noticeable if listening to the casts’ audio commentary as they constantly refer to what was filmed but is not on the screen. Every now and again we get a glimmer of what could have been and everything else we see we have seen time and time again. This is too familiar territory to take a half handed stab at things, coming across like a second rate 'The Goonies' and not enough outlandish humour to take it the way of 'Road Trip' . The start is reminisant to 'Now and Then' with touches of 'Stand By Me' . The canoe hijinks nod to 'The River Wild' , 'Deliverance' and even 'Apocalypse Now' . Even the bear joke with the mobile phone is straight out of 'Jurassic Park 3' and the two gun-totting, ATV-driving hillbillies (played gleefully by Abraham Benrubi and Ethan Suplee) are too contrived a homage to 'Deliverance' and a 'Matrix' bullet time parody is flung in for not-so-good measure which feels strangely dated now. So when we get to the serious morality twist of the ending it is as if from a different movie.
What is right with this movie is the bearded and bedraggled Burt Reynolds, with little screen time on his hands he still steals the show and hams it up all the way. Dax Shepard does a fine job too as the perpetual lying or exaggerating loser Tom and there is a great chase sequence where 'The Return of the Jedi' is parodied to perfection, which is this movie's best highlight. Also, Rachel Blanchard and Christina Moore, the hippy chicks in a tree light up things for a little while with some brown bag humour.
Don't get me wrong; there are a few laughs to be had and the movie does start off particularly well. This is just too familiar and everything on the screen you have seen before, only it was better then. Director Steven Brill (better known for scribing the woeful 'Mighty Ducks' series) might have had some laughs and originality with his previous comic directorial outings of 'Mr. Deeds' and 'Little Nicky' but this time it's just too predictable.
‘Without a Paddle’ has been given a great transfer with a crisp 5.1 sound in English, German and Turkish with lots of subtitle options. Also included are two audio commentaries again with optional subtitles. The first of these is with director Steven Brill and the second is with the main cast and with Brill kicking it off.
MTVs Making of a Movie: Without a Paddle is a 20 minute outing with the cast mostly impressed at themselves for their river antics.
Deleted scenes with optional audio commentary show lots of highlights that would have made such a better movie with their inclusion. So many wrong choices have been made here that these could have saved it from the predictable plod that it is. Even the actors are surprised by what was in the finish product (again from the audio commentary) and jokingly suggest killing Brill for what is before them.
A theatrical trailer, which indeed shows all of the best bits of the movie, and 6 teasers (which contain much footage that never made the final cut or even the deleted scenes mentioned above and again would have been much funnier if it did) complete the extra features.
Not the best outing one could have and possibly a better one if in a forgiving mood with plenty of alcohol, 'Without a Paddle' should have stuck to one type of movie and then got on with it.
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