Dinner for Schmucks (2010) ***

Dinner_for_schmucksBased on the 1999 French film ‘The Dinner Game’ (Le Dîner de cons), which I understand is by far superior to this American remake, ‘Dinner for Schmucks’ serves a tasty first course but fails to deliver a satisfying main dish. With plenty of funny moments as well as hilarious performances by comic talents including Steve Carell and Zach Galifianakis, and a little too somber of a performance by Paul Rudd, I did smile, if not LOL, most of the film, but something just didn’t add up. It may be that the film builds too much expectation towards the actual dinner, or that it takes the romantic relationship subplot too seriously, distracting from the comic theme. It also suffers from a poor plot line: a 20 minutes funny skeet idea is being stretched over a feature film length. Still, if you are looking for mindless laughs, and can settle for a dessert, the film is enjoyable.