Last month, I gave Drillbit Taylor a 40% chance of being a movie worth watching. That prediction has come true, kind of, as I consider only 40% of the movie to be worth watching. It's not a horrible movie and I laughed several times but there were too many flat jokes and stupid plot developments to recommend this to other people.
Owen Wilson plays the title character, a homeless veteran who hires himself out as a bodyguard to protect three nerdy high school boys from the bullies who torment them. Pop quiz: where in that last sentence do you see one of the stupid plot developments I was talking about? If you said, "...hires himself out as a bodyguard to protect three nerdy high school boys..." then give yourself a big, fat zero. That's not a stupid plot development. It's an outrageous premise upon which the entire movie is built and most big budget studio films, good or bad, are built on an outrageous premise. No, the stupid plot development lies in the words, "homeless veteran." Sure, there are lots of homeless veterans out there, but I simply can't figure out why Drillbit Taylor should be one of them. He's not a drunk or an addict. He doesn't hear voices or think that the CIA has implanted a microchip in this teeth. Taylor is mainly a shiftless, laid back, amoral conman who's perfectly willing to do things like steal from children and should be able to scrape together enough money to afford at least a dumpy apartment that would be far preferable to the streets he's living on.
This brings me to another stupid plot development. If this movie is to be believed, being homeless is AWESOME! Drillbit Taylor lives a very pleasant existence that mainly consists of begging for change in the morning then hanging out with his homeless buddies all day at a posh sidewalk cafe stealing food from the other customers. Up to this point in my life, I was under the impression that upscale Los Angeles restaurants wouldn't let a group of homeless men sit around at their tables all day so they could steal food and tips but, apparently, I was mistaken since that's exactly what happens.
Taylor is hired as a bodyguard by three boys (basically, the same three characters who were in Superbad, not surprising since this was written and produced by the same people) who are being tormented by a sociopathic bully. Taylor manages to convince the boys that he's a warrior of extraordinary skills even though at one point the three manage to overpower him. This leads to another stupid plot development where he decides to impersonate a substitute teacher and it works because, apparently, if you show up at a Los Angeles school and claim to be a substitute, the principal there will simply take you at your word and not check to see if you are a pedophile or just there to shoot up the place. Taylor manages to connect with the prettiest teacher there who has sex with him before she finds out his first name (or rather, the fake first name he is using, but that doesn't make it any better). Anyway, from there, hilarity ensues etc etc.
As I mentioned above, Drillbit Taylor is made by some of the same people who did Superbad and it doesn't measure up. The similarities kept making me think of the much better Superbad. This starts right from the opening where they copy Superbad's first scene: the skinny, gangly nerd talking on the phone to his fat, crude, curly haired best friend. It's not a raunchy sex comedy like Superbad was which is a shame because some raunchy sex would have taken our minds off of stupidity of the rest of the movie.
So, I guess my point is, go rent Superbad. Sure, it doesn't teach you the things that Drillbit Taylor does like that deserting from the Army during a time of war merits an extraordinarily light sentence or that sexy teachers don't really mind when their lovers lie about their backgrounds, occupations and names and will go on banging them even if they go to prison. No, Superbad doesn't have things like that, but it does have things that a comedy like Drillbit Taylor does not have, those things being actual comedy.
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