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| Zac Efron and Robert De Niro |
The needlessly raunchy and uncomfortable new comedy "Dirty Grandpa" is brazenly inappropriate and deserves a sentence cleaning bedpans at the local nursing home, which would be far better than this dreck posing as comedy. Wildly uneven and just plain stupid, it serves little purpose except for the unlikely pairing of its two leads, who are drowned in all the low-brow antics and profane language. Uptight lawyer Jason Kelly (Zac Efron) is one week away from marrying his boss's controlling daughter, putting him on the fast track for a partnership at his firm. Tricked by his grandfather Dick (Robert De Niro), Jason finds himself driving the foulmouthed old man to Daytona Beach, Fla., for a wild spring break that includes frat parties, bar fights and an epic night of karaoke. While Jason worries about the upcoming wedding, Dick tries to show his grandson how to live life to the fullest. Directed by Dan Mazer, who produced "Ali G" and "Borat," the raunchfest "Dirty Grandpa" is one of the worst films of recent memory, and completely wastes Oscar-winner De Niro, whose mugging, showing off and filthy language makes you wonder why such an esteemed actor would take such a part, surely he read the script beforehand (and I have a hard time it was to work with Efron, who, unsurprisingly, is little more than eye candy here). Raunch seems to be the order of the day, and "Dirty Grandpa" is filled with some awful moments that just aren't all that funny including De Niro hitting on a much-younger Aubrey Plaza (also wasted here), and when their dirty deed finally occurs late in the film, it's simply just gross instead of hilarious. I'm also unsure of any real "life moments" that are to be learned here, except don't let people draw swastika's in the form of male genitalia across your head, in one of the film's most offensive moments, or not to walk in on your grandpa masturbating to porn (another yuk moment that you can't get out of your head the rest of the movie). Efron and De Niro could've been paired with an actual effort at any sort of script, characters or story, because this fails on every level, particularly the climax, which veers off in a completely different direction. Appealing to the lowest common denominator possible, if your idea of fun is watching your grandpa masturbate or pinch his grandson's rear end, then go for it, but "Dirty Grandpa" is an otherwise miserable experience.
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