Role Models – Rated and Unrated Versions

Role Models Rated and Unrated
Paul Rudd, Sean William Scott, Elizabeth Banks
Directed by David Wain
Universal 2009
101 minutes

In Role Models, Danny (Paul Rudd) and Wheeler (Sean William Scott) are two Minotaur Energy Drink spokesmen who go from school to school trying to sell their product while delivering a message to children to stay off drugs. One day, after Danny discovers he has been doing the same boring job for 10 years, he decides to change things up. Unfortunately for him, this day is going to be one of his worst. In the course of the day, he will get dumped by his girlfriend (the lovely Elizabeth Banks), he’ll get into trouble with the law and Wheeler and Danny end up condemned to150 hours of community service. This is where this comedy DVD begins.

The service agency they are assigned to is called Sturdy Wings, where adults (or bigs) help kids (or littles) in need of an adult role model. Of course, our 2 bozos aren’t necessarily what we could call role models, which is what creates a lot of the comedy in this DVD. On the one hand, we have Danny who seems indifferent to any new experience and Wheeler who seems to embrace the fact that he can continue to lead his immature lifestyle instead of being in prison.

The children they are assigned to almost seem impossible to socialize. Danny is assigned to Augie (Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Superbad), a young teenage nerd who has replaced his sad reality by participating in live action role playing medieval games with his duct-tape covered foam sword. Wheeler, on the other hand, gets assigned to Ronnie (Bobb’e Thompson), the rebellious child of a busy single mom. While Augie is socially inept except when he is in his fake medieval world, Ronnie is a young 10-year old child who speaks as if he was raised in a tavern. His foul mouth and bad habits represent quite a challenge for Wheeler. For Danny, understanding Augie’s world seems to be just as much of a challenge. Will our two role models pull it off? Well, there’ll certainly be laughs along the way which is what this kind of comedy DVD provides.

The Role Models DVD provides the theatrical version as well as an unrated version of the movie. There are also some interesting bonus features like bonus deleted scenes, bloopers, in character/off script funny moments, the usual commentary with the director and an on the set feature. If you are looking for a few cheap laughs, and you don’t mind them being a bit immature, you just might like Role Models.

This comedy sometimes reminded me of Drillbit Taylor in the sense that socially inept adults are trying to help socially inept kids.

Special features on the Role Model DVD include a director’s commentary track, deleted scenes, bloopers, a making-of featurette, and a featurette on live action role-playing.

 

Related Posts