This wedding crasher stays through the honeymoon

You, Me and Dupree (2006)
Universal Pictures presents a Russo brothers film, starring Owen Wilson, Matt Dillon and Kate Hudson. Written by Mike LeSieur. 108m. PG-13 for sexual content, brief nudity, crude humor, language and a drug reference.

1.5 stars

Molly and Carl Peterson are newlyweds already in trouble.

Their life before nuptials was idyllic; afterwards, it has become catastrophic. The catalyst for this downward spiral is a flaxen-haired mop-top named Dupree (Owen Wilson), a ne’er-do-well who invades the couple’s suburban honeymoon after being fired from his job as a copier-machine salesman.

Laughably, he’s best buddies with the decidedly more industrious Carl (Matt Dillon), who is perhaps the first character in cinematic history to marry the boss’s daughter and not try to parlay that conquest into a substantial promotion.

And oh, what a score it is for this career-minded chap. Molly (Kate Hudson) cooks, cleans and has more than one outfit that fetishizes her cute behind. She demonstrates little a posteriori knowledge of her beau in tow, depending instead on her half-baked houseguest to fill her in on the particulars.

Meanwhile, Carl is being systematically emasculated at work by his new father-in-law (Michael Douglas, so imagine Gordon Gecko without the bloodthirst) who is not above a little chicanery. He hijacks Carl’s development designs, while unsubtly advocating vasectomy for his newly inherited son.

This marriage is one call-in to Dr. Laura from going completely south.

I have a healthy respect for Wilson. As gag man in his partnership with filmmaker Wes Anderson, the Butterscotch Stallion has undoubtedly turned many great scripts into curious classics. But it was Anderson’s reverence for the medium that provided an important, unshakeable foundation.

The greatest miscalculation of “You, Me and Dupree” is that it leans too heavily on Wilson’s surfer smile and queasy charm. Trading Vince Vaughan for Matt Dillon as sidekick has made Wilson’s post-wedding-crasher into an embarrassing interloper instead of an endearing houseguest.

Hudson was shockingly dynamic in “Almost Famous,” a breakout performance that feels eons ago only because the charismatic actress has been the lynchpin of so many successive bombs. “Dupree” is a gross misappropriation of her talents. I’d call the script misogynistic, if doing so didn’t inherently suggest that first-time screenwriter Mike LeSieur even understood the basics about women.

Hudson shockingly allows herself to be exploited by the script’s juvenile setups, including a bikini-ready fantasy sequence which has the distinction of being the only scene given real direction to by the television-trained Anthony and Joe Russo.

We hear much about the off-screen machinations of other female characters – including the domineering madam married to Neil (Seth Rogan), a fellow friend of Carl’s who continually longs for the long-passed independence of fraternity life. But women are treated like hostile combatants to this testosterone-induced prose, and no one steals more than a few seconds of screen time.

Despite this wrong turn, the film is not devoid of it own charming moments. Dupree has a gentle sensibility around the neighborhood children, tempting me to errantly guess that the script would transform this gadabout into a bona fide school teacher.

Oh, our favorite moocher will finally manage that previously unattainable solvency, but how I must not reveal. If I did so, it would undoubtedly temper the only sustained laughs you may experience in this entire film.