In the first two decades of the 21st century, I felt like I was the only person who wasn’t swept up in the wave of raunchy hard-R comedies of the time. The appeal of The Hangover, to cite just one example, completely failed to connect with me, and that there were two sequels boggles my mind. And yet, there a few such films which did succeed, especially Eurotrip. There is also 2008’s Role Models.
If I bother with such a film, it should be deeply raunchy, and this one fits the bill. Paul Rudd and Seann William Scott are two deeply flawed characters who find themselves having to do community service for an organization like Big Brothers / Big Sisters, where they each have to mentor a difficult kid.
Rudd, a severe cynic, is paired with Christopher Mintz-Plasse, playing a nerd whose only social interaction is through a LARP that is a medieval war game. I won’t be the one to throw shade on such hobbies, but the script and its characters will, and most of the barbs land. There is particular amusement to be found in the idea most of the participants are adults, such as Ken Jeong’s king, who literally holds court at a restaurant that stands in for Denny’s. One of his lackeys actually hand feeds him.
Scott is a perpetually horny man-child who is assigned to Bobb’e J. Thompson, a deliriously foul-mouthed kid who has exhausted every previous mentor. We first see him making a drawing with the helpful text “Beyonce pouring sugar on my dick.” These two will bond over their shared loved of boobies. Against all logic, Scott will also convince this Black kid of the greatness of the band Kiss, if only because of all the action those guys must be getting, even in their advanced years.
Our protagonists ended up here after losing their job at the fictitious energy drink company Minotaur. As representatives, they had the questionable job of going to schools for presentations where they ostensibly try to convince kids to stay off drugs and instead channel those cravings to consuming their employer’s product. At their last gig, Rudd is so distraught that he is telling the kids to go ahead and just do drugs, since life sucks.
Leaving the school, he and Scott discover the company vehicle, a monster truck made up like a giant bull, is being towed. They lose a weird tug of war against that other vehicle and their truck ends up mounting the school’s horse statue in the most obvious way.
The reason Rudd was so down because long-suffering girlfriend Elizabeth Banks has finally decided she can’t stand him anymore as he has increasingly become a miserable dick. The straw which broke the minotaur’s back was a tirade at a coffee shop that is obviously supposed to be a Starbucks, as it has the same-named drink sizes which have always irritated me, with the faux-sophistication conveyed by each being in a different language. As he says to barista he’s pointlessly needling, telling her she’s an asshole in three languages. Banks points out the venti is called such because it is twenty ounces. I will confess, I had not considered that.
There will be a couple of interesting adults at the charity where our protagonists end up. A.D. Miles is an overly enthusiastic and deeply naïve fellow mentor. Jane Lynch, as the leader of the organization, is suspicious of the two on first sight, with constant references to a troubled past that makes her think others had a similar background. It isn’t too far off in every regard from her character in A Mighty Wind. Still, she genuinely cares for her clients, even going to far to warn against physical activities, as some of them are “allergic to their own sweat.”
And yet Rudd and Mintz-Plasse will get a fair amount of exercise from those large-scale sword-and-sorcery tournaments. At first, Rudd is completely dismissive, making such comments as “I’m a pacifist. I don’t believe in imaginary bloodshed.” But meeting the kid’s deeply disapproving parents makes Rudd defensive and, eventually, he and much of the rest of the cast are drawn into a huge tournament at the end. Still, I agree with his advice to the lad about taking off the cape when not on the battlefield: “People tend avoid people in capes.”
I could transcribe a couple of pages of lines I found funny in Role Models, but that would be a pointless exercise. There is much to enjoy here for those who can enjoy profane humor. I laughed as much as I did only because the humor is almost entirely restricted to dialogue, with a near-absence of physical gross-out gags. Also, it helps that, while it may not have a heart of gold, its largely good nature suggests at least a reasonable plating of the metal.
Dir: David Wain
Starring Paul Rudd, Seann William Scott, Elizabeth Banks
Watched on blu-ray as the unrated cut