The Three Stooges

For once, a modern revival of
a screen classic gets it right, as the new version of The Three Stooges is just as blissfully moronic as the originals.

Long a staple of low-rent UHF
stations and hackneyed punch lines about the taste differences between men and
women, the dependable old Stooges haven’t been seen much in recent years, and
this big-screen revival has languished in development hell for more than a
decade. Along the way, a string of big names were briefly attached, including
Jim Carrey, Hank Azaria, Benicio Del Toro and Sean Penn, which is curious,
since the dour Penn hasn’t been intentionally funny since Fast Times at
Ridgemont High. It’s probably for the best that the stars all passed on it,
since the Stooges are lowbrow idols, and the spectacle of marquee names
slumming would’ve distracted from what is already a fairly dubious enterprise.

Instead of stars we get the
lower-wattage likes of Will Sasso, Chris Diamantopoulos and, shockingly, Will
and Grace vet Sean Hayes, who does an uncanny impersonation of the
inimitable Larry Fine. As Larry, Moe and Curly, this motley crew were left on
the doorstep of an orphanage, where they remain as adults, since no one is dumb
enough to adopt them. Their rearing is left to the nuns, played by familiar
faces like Jane Lynch, Jennifer Hudson and, absurdly, Larry David, as the
ball-busting “Sister Mary Mengele.” Prolonged exposure to corporal punishment
may explain why these guys handle every problem by conking each other in the
noggin with sledgehammers, though how they survive the head trauma is left to
artistic license. Due to the Stooges various blunders, the orphanage is facing
foreclosure and nearly a million dollars in unpaid liability claims, which the
boys are determined to make up — any stupid way they can. This, of course,
involves mayhem, wackiness and endless slaps and eye pokes, as our trio of
goons gets caught up in a murder plot involving a trophy wife (Sofia Vergara)
and her sleazy lover (Craig Bierko).

All is but an excuse for
slapstick and hokey puns that were musty 60 years ago. Such antics are
tolerable in tiny doses, but the movie’s slight 92-minute running time is
really pushing things. Working under the PG guidelines, the famously raunchy
Farrelly brothers manage to mostly restrain themselves, though there’s a
literal pissing contest, with infant boys used as squirt guns. You could argue
that this scene, along with cameos by some truly loathsome reality TV types,
are slaps to the Stooges “legacy,” but that implies that the Three Stooges were
ever really funny.

This article appears in Apr 11-17, 2012.