Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo

[edotherocket 0]

BY ROGER EBERT / August 12, 2005

 

Cast & Credits

Deuce Bigalow: Rob Schneider

T.J. Hicks: Eddie Griffin

Det. Gaspar: Jeroen Krabbe

Heinz Hummer: Til Schweiger

Greta: Dana Min Goodman

 

Columbia Pictures presents a film directed by Mike Bigelow. Written by Harris Goldberg, Rob Schneider, David Garrett and Jason Ward. Running time: 75 mintes. Rated R (for pervasive strong crude and sexual humor, language, nudity, and drug content).

 

 

"Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo" makes a living cleaning fish tanks and occasionally prostituting himself. How much he charges I'm not sure, but the price is worth it if it keeps him off the streets and out of another movie. "Deuce Bigalow" is aggressively bad, as if it wants to cause suffering to the audience. The best thing about it is that it runs for only 75 minutes.

 

Rob Schneider is back, playing a male prostitute (or, as the movie reminds us dozens of times, a "man whore"). He is not a gay hustler, but specializes in pleasuring women, although the movie's closest thing to a sex scene is when he wears diapers on orders from a giantess. Oh, and he goes to dinner with a woman with a laryngectomy, who sprays wine on him through her neck vent.

 

The plot: Deuce visits his friend T.J. Hicks (Eddie Griffin) in Amsterdam, where T.J. is a pimp specializing in man-whores. Business is bad, because a serial killer is murdering male prostitutes, and so Deuce acts as a decoy to entrap the killer. In his investigation he encounters a woman with a penis for a nose. You don't want to know what happens when she sneezes.

 

Does this sound like a movie you want to see? It sounds to me like a movie that Columbia Pictures and the film's producers (Glenn S. Gainor, Jack Giarraputo, Tom McNulty, Nathan Talbert Reimann, Adam Sandler and John Schneider) should be discussing in long, sad conversations with their inner child.

 

The movie created a spot of controversy last February. According to a story by Larry Carroll of MTV News, Rob Schneider took offense when Patrick Goldstein of the Los Angeles Times listed this year's Best Picture Nominees and wrote that they were "ignored, unloved and turned down flat by most of the same studios that ... bankroll hundreds of sequels, including a follow-up to 'Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo,' a film that was sadly overlooked at Oscar time because apparently nobody had the foresight to invent a category for Best Running Penis Joke Delivered by a Third-Rate Comic."

 

Schneider retaliated by attacking Goldstein in full-page ads in Daily Variety and the Hollywood Reporter. In an open letter to Goldstein, Schneider wrote: "Well, Mr. Goldstein, I decided to do some research to find out what awards you have won. I went online and found that you have won nothing. Absolutely nothing. No journalistic awards of any kind ... Maybe you didn't win a Pulitzer Prize because they haven't invented a category for Best Third-Rate, Unfunny Pompous Reporter Who's Never Been Acknowledged by His Peers."

 

Reading this, I was about to observe that Schneider can dish it out but he can't take it. Then I found he's not so good at dishing it out, either. I went online and found that Patrick Goldstein has won a National Headliner Award, a Los Angeles Press Club Award, a RockCritics.com award, and the Publicists' Guild award for lifetime achievement.

 

Schneider was nominated for a 2000 Razzie Award for Worst Supporting Actor, but lost to Jar-Jar Binks.

 

But Schneider is correct, and Patrick Goldstein has not yet won a Pulitzer Prize. Therefore, Goldstein is not qualified to complain that Columbia financed "Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo" while passing on the opportunity to participate in "Million Dollar Baby," "Ray," "The Aviator," "Sideways" and "Finding Neverland." As chance would have it, I have won the Pulitzer Prize, and so I am qualified. Speaking in my official capacity as a Pulitzer Prize winner, Mr. Schneider, your movie sucks.

 

Sounds like a horrible film but that is a pretty funny review right there.

[Guest JMA]

[Guest Fishyswa]

Perfect example of why movie critics are useless. The movie was bad because of this joke or that joke. Why? What was wrong with the joke? Did you just not find it funny, did it seem misplaced, too over the top?

 

No insight into the film beyond "I didn't like it because I didn't like it", unless of course you like reading up on irrelevant fueds between two idiots....

[Yuna_Firerose 0]

In no defense of the movie, I have to agree with Fishyswa. Ebert just says its bad but doesn't particuraly say why, aside from a sparse few examples. Then, clearly with nothing else to say, he reports on something that is not really his business.

 

With that said, the movie poster alone doesn't garner any interest from me. It looks so damn Photoshopped as to be inhuman (Rob's head alone looks pasted on... hell, the expression is the same from 'Hot Chick', I think).

 

I didn't particuraly care for the first movie, so the sequeal just induces a groan. A sequeal to the Hot Chick, though? Well, my opinion would certainly be different.

[Art Sandusky 0]

75 minutes?! Talk about an afterthought of a studio project.

[Guest JMA]

It's sad to see how creatively bankrupt Hollywood has become. It's all about sequels, movies based on old TV shows, and remakes (only King Kong looks to be good).

[AndrewTS 0]

Does Ebert really need to tell you anything that the trailers don't already?

[Red Baron 0]

Why does Hollywood intend to make bad sequels from bad movies?

[AndrewTS 0]

Why does Hollywood intend to make bad sequels from bad movies?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Duece 1 made lots of $$$.

 

Plus Rob is close friends with Adam Sandler.

[razazteca 0]

So how are the cameo's of SNL's 3rd rate actors in this movie?

[Placebo Effect 0]

Ebert's been in the business for thirty something years or what not. I don't blame him for not wanting to explain why a sequel to Deuce Bigalow is awful.

 

Schneider was nominated for a 2000 Razzie Award for Worst Supporting Actor, but lost to Jar-Jar Binks.

....

 

As chance would have it, I have won the Pulitzer Prize, and so I am qualified. Speaking in my official capacity as a Pulitzer Prize winner, Mr. Schneider, your movie sucks.

 

Ohhh SNAP.

[bob_barron 0]

Perfect example of why movie critics are useless. The movie was bad because of this joke or that joke. Why? What was wrong with the joke? Did you just not find it funny, did it seem misplaced, too over the top?

 

No insight into the film beyond "I didn't like it because I didn't like it", unless of course you like reading up on irrelevant fueds between two idiots....

 

I think he spells out why he thought the movie sucked. The jokes sound stupid and juvenile, and just gross for the sake of being gross.

 

Should Ebert spell it out for you?

 

In no defense of the movie, I have to agree with Fishyswa. Ebert just says its bad but doesn't particuraly say why, aside from a sparse few examples. Then, clearly with nothing else to say, he reports on something that is not really his business.

 

I think Yuna is still bitter about Ebert dissing Johnny on Charlie.

 

Rob Schneider made the issue between him and the critic his business and Ebert delighted in making him look stupid.

[Guest JMA]

I don't think Ebert is the best critic out there or anything, but he's completely right here. Hell, even a non-critic can see that this movie is half baked.

[Guest Fishyswa]

He did more of a review on the trailers than he did on the movie. Where did he describe the movie outside a few jokes? Story? Other actors? Anything other than "this joke is immature and I don't like it"? No.

 

Just because it's clear the movie's gonna suck doesn't mean you can basically repeat the trailer for us, bring up some irrelevant shit and still call it a review.

[bob_barron 0]

It's Deuce Bigalow, a 75 minute movie that he gave zero stars too.

 

I don't think he has to go in-depth as to why this movie didn't work.

 

It's obvious he thought evertything about the movie was terrible, and thought recapping a stupid feud Rob Schneider started to be more relevant.

[Guest Fishyswa]

"I don't think he has to go in-depth as to why this movie didn't work."

 

I think he does, considering it's the point of writing a review in the first place.

 

"It's obvious he thought evertything about the movie was terrible,"

 

So, any idiot can just slag off a movie and talk about something else, he's supposed to be some form of a professional.

 

"and thought recapping a stupid feud Rob Schneider started to be more relevant."

 

In what way? It's idiotic and pointless to viewing the movie.

[CanadianChris 0]

Obviously, he decided that any review of the movie would just be a pointless waste of newsprint, and decided to write something far more entertaining. Can't say as I blame him.

[Gary Floyd 0]

I don't think Ebert is the best critic out there or anything, but he's completely right here. Hell, even a non-critic can see that this movie is half baked.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

This reminds me: I went to see "Wedding Crashers" last Wednesday night, and the trailer for the new "Deuce Bigalow" movie was shown. Everyone in the audience simply stared at the screen, dumbfounded that Hollywood would actually do a movie like this. Eveyone except this one fat chick, who was also the most annoying woman in the theatre. I felt bad for her boyfriend; here she is, the only one laughing at a preview of a horrendous looking movie, actually thinking that it will be funny, and her boyfriend right next to her has this look on his face, which says "I don't know this woman."

[Guest JMA]

I don't think Ebert is the best critic out there or anything, but he's completely right here. Hell, even a non-critic can see that this movie is half baked.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

This reminds me: I went to see "Wedding Crashers" last Wednesday night, and the trailer for the new "Deuce Bigalow" movie was shown. Everyone in the audience simply stared at the screen, dumbfounded that Hollywood would actually do a movie like this. Eveyone except this one fat chick, who was also the most annoying woman in the theatre. I felt bad for her boyfriend; here she is, the only one laughing at a preview of a horrendous looking movie, actually thinking that it will be funny, and her boyfriend right next to her has this look on his face, which says "I don't know this woman."

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Well, at least you got to see Wedding Crashers (which was very good).

[Guest Fishyswa]

"Obviously, he decided that any review of the movie would just be a pointless waste of newsprint, and decided to write something far more entertaining. Can't say as I blame him."

 

How is some pathetic "fued" between some obscure writer and the guy in the horrible movie more entertaining than the movie? That kind of logic made Paris Hilton a star.

[Ravenbomb 0]

*shrug* I liked it (the review, not the movie)

[Your Paragon of Virtue 0]

"Obviously, he decided that any review of the movie would just be a pointless waste of newsprint, and decided to write something far more entertaining. Can't say as I blame him."

 

How is some pathetic "fued" between some obscure writer and the guy in the horrible movie more entertaining than the movie? That kind of logic made Paris Hilton a star.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

No, your logic is off, as it's very possible to see something in real life that's funnier than something in a movie. Also don't get the Paris reference, but maybe I'm missing something.

 

He really didn't harp on the feud, just pointed out how pathetic Rob was in that he can make fun of others but when he gets criticized, he whines and takes out a full page ad bashing the critic. In an hilarious twist of irony, he messes up the bashing and falls on his face. I can't imagine anything in Deuce Bigelow being funnier than that.

 

Look at it this way; his type of audience probably wouldn't want to see this movie, and they'd probably be more content to read a witty write up making fun of the movie than an honest review of the movie. Call it a generalization, but most people that would enjoy this movie probably wouldn't go to read anything a critic says. Hell, most of those people probably can't read.

[Guest Fishyswa]

"No, your logic is off, as it's very possible to see something in real life that's funnier than something in a movie."

 

Yeah, if it's actually funny. Rob Schneider doing something sad isn't really funny at all.

 

"Also don't get the Paris reference, but maybe I'm missing something."

 

More interested in some sort of "real" drama involving the people making a product than the product itself. It's scary.

 

"He really didn't harp on the feud, just pointed out how pathetic Rob was in that he can make fun of others but when he gets criticized, he whines and takes out a full page ad bashing the critic."

 

Why is it relevant to the movie? How does knowing that affect viewing the movie one way or the other? It doesn't, and it's useless in a review of said movie.

 

"In an hilarious twist of irony, he messes up the bashing and falls on his face. I can't imagine anything in Deuce Bigelow being funnier than that."

 

Everything I saw in the commercial was funnier than that.

 

"Look at it this way; his type of audience probably wouldn't want to see this movie, and they'd probably be more content to read a witty write up making fun of the movie than an honest review of the movie. Call it a generalization, but most people that would enjoy this movie probably wouldn't go to read anything a critic says. Hell, most of those people probably can't read."

 

I can understand assuming this is bad based off the plot, actors involved and trailers, but if your gonna generalize everyone who enjoys a movie into being illiterate because it's bad, you should at least have seen the movie and have real grounds to talk.

 

I just think if someone's gonna do a review on a movie, they should you know, REVIEW THE MOVIE. Call me crazy...

[Yuna_Firerose 0]

"you should at least of seen the movie"

at least have seen the movie.

[Guest Fishyswa]

Thanks I do that all the time.

[NoCalMike 0]

Rob Schiender was on the JiM rome show a couple of weeks ago to promote the movie and he made a good point that you can't take a reviewer's opinion on comedies too seriously because they take shit so personally. I guess Ebert panned the firs Deuce Bigelow, proclaming the jokes weren't funny and all that shit, despite him sitting in a theater full of people laughing hysterically and cracking up, and of course he didn't mention that fact when he wrote his review regarding everything falling flat.

[bob_barron 0]

But the first Deuce Bigelow sucked too.

 

Except for the stuff with Amy Poehler.

[spman 0]

I think the fact that Ebert doesn't really delve into speicifcs as to why this film is so bad is his way of saying "If you really need me to tell you that the new Rob Schneider movie sucks, then you should probobly just stop going to the movies and stay at home". It's not as if Ebert has some sort of vendetta against Sandler and co. or even against raunchy comedies, as he gave pretty positive reveiws to other works like The Longest Yard, 50 First Dates, and Little Nicky. Don't interpret Eberts deviation from talking about the film as a lack of integrity, interpret it as him hoping that his audience is smart enough to not even have to read a review of such a film to know that it's not any good.

[Your Paragon of Virtue 0]

The generalization thing was a joke, as I don't care about the movie.

 

To add to that; I don't give a shit about this movie. Most who like Ebert's reviews won't either, neither will Ebert himself. So the need for an actual review that takes this movie seriously is pointless. If you like the movie, great. But don't complain about a critic panning it and not explaining why, especially when it's understood why he doesn't have to.

 

Rob says the problem with critics is that they take things personally? Him taking out a full page ad and attacking a writer's credentials isn't taking things personally? Heh.

[strummer 0]

The thing about Rob is that his peers obviously find him funny. Sandler, Norm, Farley, Spade all love(d) the guy and think he's hilarious. The problem is that it must not translate into being funny in public. I've never been a fan, even back to the copy man bits from 1990. All his bits on SNL were lame. I really can't believe Julia Sweeney dated this guy. Although they might have gotten along, both being equally unfunny.