R E V I E W S

Joe Dirt (2001)

Starring: David Space, Brittany Daniel, Dennis Miller, Adam Beach
Director: Dennie Gordon
Rating: PG-13

Studio: Columbia

Review Posted: 4.16.01

Rating: 1.5/4

By Michael Brendan McLarney.

"Malodorous Mullet"

In the new comedy "Joe Dirt", a slovenly janitor accidentally stumbles into a Los Angeles radio talk show, gets invited as a guest and begins telling his life story. His tale is a sad one. At the age of eight, he was ditched by his parents while vacationing at the Grand Canyon, and ever since he's been stumbling around from state to state, performing odd jobs and wondering why his mom and dad bolted. Soon all of Los Angeles (and the nation) are captivated by his story. The radio host conveys to Dirt his disbelief that someone who so perfectly embodies a white-trash idiot can maintain such a positive outlook on life and a potent tenacity to move forward. At this point I'm thinking to myself: if this guy really did have a positive outlook and potent tenacity, would he really embody a white-trash idiot to perfection?

Obviously, one can say I'm applying too much logic to a movie of this sort. But my above observation sums up the film's problem; the audience is expected to like the character of Joe Dirt, yet the movie clearly doesn't. It's like if "Wayne's World" was told through the eyes of Rob Lowe's villain. The movie hates this guy, why should we cheer for him? At about the midpoint, I did feel sorry for him, but that's not the same thing.

Joe Dirt is played by David Spade, who also co-wrote the screenplay. His underdog persona and sardonic wit work fairly well on NBC's "Just Shoot Me". His big screen forays haven't been nearly as effective. The movie spends so much time putting Dirt through a conveyor of condescending slapstick - everything from dousing him in crap (real crap, that is) to being cruelly laughed at and beaten up to even being tossed around by a crocodile - then pulling a one-eighty and hoping to gain the audience's sympathy. I'm all for sympathizing with a main character, but you can't expect me to love him after going to such lengths in humiliating him.

Consider the aforementioned "Wayne's World". Both films are about quirky and unusual characters, yet the respective tones sit at opposite ends of the comic spectrum. Wayne Campbell and Garth Algar - like Joe Dirt - are quirky and unusual outcasts who hold their own view of the world they inhabit. But that movie clearly loved Wayne and Garth. It was their world, and the story was told from their unique perspectives. I think the filmmakers here were going for something similar, but the tone is all wrong. The movie approaches the story utilizing a cynical perspective that could only come from those who hate Joe Dirt. The movie's not so much funny as it is depressing.

The film does contain one line that could have taken it into a much better direction. At one point, the radio shock-jock (a somewhat typecast Dennis Miller) questions his early childhood love of hard rock music, suspecting that he may have loved someone like Leif Garrett instead. "I'm a rocker, through and through," is Dirt's reply. "Here are some of my favorite bands: AC/DC, Van Halen ... not Van Hagar..." Now, that could have led to something worthwhile. Let's us know more about what Joe Dirt really likes, what possible dreams of rock stardom he has, what he really thinks of his Mullet wig. I would have laughed a great deal more at that than sitting through a movie that takes pride in beating him into submission.

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