These Role Models needed role models

In this comedy, Paul Rudd and Seann William Scott play two men who are hardly model citizens. But their bad behavior puts them in trouble with the law, and soon the men must act as mentors as a part of their community service. Christopher Mintz-Plasse (McLovin of Superbad fame), costars in Role Models.

Danny (Rudd) and Wheeler (Scott) work for energy-drink company Minotaur, driving a novelty monster truck to schools where they -- Wheeler costumed as hairy "Minotaur Man" -- plug their legal-high product via "Just say no to drugs!" slogans. It's a no-brainer job that suits Wheeler fine, leaving him free to obsess 24/7 over his only real interest, which is getting laid. Danny, however, thinks he's wasting his life. Feeling a need for change, he impulsively proposes to longtime girlfriend Beth (Elizabeth Banks), but she's so fed up with his sourpuss attitude that she dumps him outright. An already horrible day ends in a tow-truck altercation that leaves the two boy-men facing 30 days in jail on various charges. Beth, a lawyer, manages to cut them a deal for 150 community service hours instead. They're handed over to Sturdy Wings, a big-brother-type mentoring program run by Gayle Sweeney, played by Jane Lynch as a one-woman Molotov cocktail, equal parts perky, stern and lunatic. Wheeler gets assigned Ronnie (Bobb'e J. Thompson), a fatherless 10-year-old with a vile temper and filthier mouth. Sarcastic Danny gets Augie (Christopher Mintz-Plasse) a teenage dork with no friends outside the realm of his ultra-dweeby live-action medieval fantasy role-playing game. Needless to say, these forced pairings do not start well, though with equal predictability, bonding does eventually occur -- if not always in the most age-appropriate ways. There's also no great surprise to the adult blunders that nearly wreck these intergenerational relationships, or to the big, climactic setpiece in which the guilty parties make sacrifices that prove they care after all. Although, it was overly predictable, it still worked on all levels. Rudd and Scott work well together as friends (or not as Danny repeatedly tells Wheeler) who are polar opposites. Throw in a couple kids, one who is so foul mouthed you'd think that you were talking to "Child's Plays" Chucky, and another who is so nerdy that you'd think he'd feel a lot better all alone in his room (Mintz-Plasse gets another ride out of his "Superbad" persona, endearing in his devotion to a hopelessly dorky hobby but more self-aware and less manic than Fogell was.) Rudd's weary cynicism serves him as well as ever, though one wonders if the actor (who co-wrote the screenplay) isn't enjoying it as much as he appeared to in earlier outings like "Knocked Up. Although supporting players earn their keep. Banks' role is too straight to allow her to get any laughs, but Jane Lynch (as a reformed druggie in charge of the kids) plays up some repeated jokes to good effect. The real scene-stealer is the rock band KISS: They don't appear in the film, but a couple of the biggest laughs rely on them. Role Models is one that will be remembered as one of the funniest comedies of the year right beside "Tropic Thunder". A laugh out loud 4 on my "Go See" scale.