Smoke Gets In Your Eyes... Or Their Eyes... Something.

I'm really too old for the cult of Doogie Howser, MD. I was in my twenties when it started, and the premise, while charming, never really did it for me (14 year old doctor/genius... whatev).  But I can see why, for high school geeks like the kind I was, such a premise, smartly played, would have lasting impact.

No, for me, the appreciation of Neil Patrick Harris is in what he's become: the child star who's not a cautionary tale, the guy who proves it's possible to be a working actor and not wind up a tabloid nightmare (I was going to say "not warped"... but I think he kind of might be... in a good way), and of course, the guy who's comfortably gay without making a big deal of it.

I mention all of this, of course, because it's impossible to discuss Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay and not mentioon the Cult of Neil. The one-two punch of Neil's first star turn in Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle, followed by the immediate success of How I Met Your Mother, is what revived Neil's place in pop culture, and it's to his credit that he's managed to make a new career as the youthful, leering bore work for him far better than it should, by rights.

It also kind of goes without saying that Neil's all-too-brief turn in H&K...Gunatanamo Bay is the film's finest 15 minutes (if that).  Too brief, too funny, the scenes with Harris are every bit as anarchic and amusing as the first go round (who else, really, could make "I'm going to get my f*ck on"  both rallying cry and pathetic, at once?), and they underscore the best and worst of sequels like this, where what worked the first time can't sustain a second go round. And what we're left with is a pale notion of what made the first one such a left field success.

I must admit, I never expected to be a fan of stoner, dumb straight boy comedies.  I was never a Cheech and Chong fan, and though I was and remain a fan of the teen sex comedy, rarely have I ever sunk to the level of Porky's and the like. Leering looks at boobies... not so much my scene.

Still... when I tcik off my enjoyment of Friday, Dude, Where's My Car? and the original Harold and Kumar, I have to admit there's something to the loping, off kilter sensibility of recent stoner films that appeals.  That was certainly the case with Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle, which like the other originals, shared the quality of a goofy quest - usually involving munchies - that are like The Wizard of Oz, or an Arthurian legend.

In the case of Harold and Kumar, much of the strength of it rests in the multi-culti premise, putting stars John Cho and Kal Penn front and center and deconstructing Asian and Indian cultural expectations in interesting ways.  That's particularly true of Harold, whose straight arrow, overachieving nature seems at odds with a stoner life... except that it's not.

What worked so brilliantly in the first film - aside from Harris - was the "life is short... ease up" quality of its message. The simplicity of the quest, the way it pulled together these imminent changes in both the guys lives, gave the usual haphazard adventures more resonance than one might otherwise expect.

The problem with H&KGB shows up pretty early; we're not so much setting off on a new quest as we are reprising the initial stories.  The tone feels off pretty much from the get go, and never quite recovers. Harold and Kumar set off to the airport to chase Harold's new love interest to Amsterdam (hint: more weed), and run into Kumar's old flame, Vanessa, on the way to her wedding in Texas.  Getting mistaken for terrorists mid-flight, H&K are seized and shipped off to Gitmo, where hilarity ensues.

Escaping from the base, the two set off on another quixotic quest, this time to stop Vanessa's wedding, but the urgency in this is kind of lost, and the wacky setups along the way (the South Beach gangsta friend, the redneck cabin in Alabama, getting lost in the urban hoods of Birmingham, the Klan rally... never quite gel. By the time Harris shows up, things are pretty chaotic and only intermittently funny... but hepped up on shrooms, driving recklessly and swilling from a handle of Jack Daniels... Harrs is all he needs to be, and more. If the Texas cathouse sequence (where else to get your f*ck on) doesn't quite work (it's the leering at bosoms thing, again), it still, for a moment, feels inspired.

But Harris is gone too soon, and after that, we're stuck in weak re-Graduate territory that feels more than a little tired and familiar (why do stoner films so often lose their way about 75 minutes in...?); the ending is convenient, and more than a bit forced, and the tying up of loose ends is more than a little lazy and slapdash.

All of which might be irrelevant were the whole exercise tighter and funnier; but too often, the jokes aren't well timed, and much of the anti-government satire is hit or miss, and more miss than hit. Which is a shame, because what's frustrating here isn't what doesn't work... it's what does: the natural rhythm of a close friendship between Harold and Kumar still feels spot-on, the cross-cultural experiences reflect a very real America, and area reminder of how far we've come in blending cultures... even if it's around weed.

It's hard to blame Cho and Penn, who are game enough, and too talented to fail, really. I'm less impressed with Rob Corddry's Homeland Security Chief, whose way too one note and not as funny as it must have seemed on paper. That's also the case with Danneel Harris, whose Vanessa seems colorless, and not really fleshed out.  Mostly though, I'd say the responsibility falls on Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg, sharing writing and directing duties, and don't seem strong enough on either front.

That may not matter; as with any cult, the NPH thing is sort of bulletproof, and fans of the first H&K may be willing to overlook a lot (they may, after all, may be too stoned to care about things like, you know, plot coherence).  But I think perhaps I'm heartened that Seriously Dude... Where's My Car never got made; perhaps the real secret of stoner flicks is that they are more one time pleasures than sustained  storylines, easily repeated.  I mean, it's not like you can go through life constantly stoned... right? :)

Comments

[JoBiv]

Funny, W, I've never been a stoner (EVOR, no joke!) and for some reason the first H&K and movies like Half Baked make me laugh like a jackal. I think the key is the constant and random sprinkle of smart jokes among the stupid. And, of course, the shocking cameos.