Writer: John Phillips
Director: Dan Mazer
At the funeral of his wife, Dick Kelly (De Niro) asks grandson - and corporate lawyer - Jason (Efron) to drive him to Florida as a favour. Jason's none too keen on the idea because he's wrapped up not only in his work but also in last-minute preparations for his wedding to Meredith (Julianne Hough). Meredith is spoiled, materialistic, bossy and annoying so it's obvious why Jason would be falling over himself to marry such a woman. I wonder if he'll have second thoughts during the movie? Hmm.
I digress. Dick can't drive himself as he's recently lost his licence and he also sees it as a chance for some grandpa/grandson bonding time so Jason agrees reluctantly to help out his grieving grandad, a decision he soon regrets as Dick's true motives for the Florida trip become abundantly clear...
Right, let's get Dirty Grandpa's only useful message out of the way - men and women of advancing years don't stop wanting to have fun and, yes, that includes wanting to have sex. I'm fine with that. It's a great thing for a movie to say. Society shouldn't ignore someone just because they're deemed to be "old".
Okay, now let's deal with the rest of it.
It's horrible.
On the face of it, Dirty Grandpa's dirty sense of humour should have been right up my street and the concept of uptight youngster Efron being given valuable life lessons from freewheeling pensioner De Niro had more than a little comedy potential but there's nothing smart or snappy here, just a relentlessly tiresome series of depressingly crude and tasteless gags whose opening gambit is the thoroughly unedifying sight of De Niro knocking one out. Yes, that's Oscar-winning actor Robert De Niro right there, strangling the Womble in glorious widescreen.
Efron is called upon to look embarrassed for most of the movie which can't have been much of a stretch considering the various indignities the plot piles on him for hopefully comic effect. During the proceedings, his character accidentallly smokes crack, accidentally ends up in jail and is accidentally mistaken for a paedophile. You may accidentally laugh. I did not.
Yes, you read that correctly - there's a scene in which a nearly-naked (then totally naked) Efron is mistaken for a paedophile. There is no depth to which this film will not stoop. At that point it had already made me not laugh about such subjects as cancer, drug abuse and homosexuality so the bar was being set lower with each passing minute. Actually, come to think of it, when one moment involves De Niro resting his tackle next to Efron's face you realise there was never a bar in the first place.
Actually, if there's one person that looks more embarrassed than Efron it's Dermot Mulroney, lumbered with the thankless role of Efron's dad, whose main purpose is to look disapprovingly at De Niro's septuagenarian shenanigans. Oh, and to have several dicks drawn on his face too. It's making me miserable typing this so I'm not even going to start on the decision to cast Aubrey Plaza and then waste her talent in the most criminal manner possible.
Well, okay, I'm going to have to talk about Aubrey Plaza. Aubrey Plaza is great in everything she appears in. Or rather she was until she appeared in this. It's not even Ms Plaza's fault. She gives her role the best shot she could have done but her character's one of many duds. Not as much of a dud as Jason's wacky cousin - I was hoping for him to be kidnapped early on in the proceedings and never rescued - but a dud nonetheless.
Plaza's character, for want of a better expression, likes to do old guys. The clever subtext here though is....oh, come on, there is no clever subtext here, she just likes to do old guys. And talk about doing old guys in the same grubby way De Niro talks about things such as...no, I can't carry on with this. Even the attempt to add a little sweetness into the mix with a subplot charting the burgeoning friendship between Jason and eco-minded Shadia (Deutch) is obliterated by the script's drive to be cheerfully offensive at every turn. It isn't cheerful, it certainly isn't anywhere near offensive, it's stunningly dull and unforgivably unfunny.
What is with you, Zac Efron? You've managed to follow up We Are Your Friends with something equally horrid. How? As for Robert De Niro, I'm kind of hoping that the film makers cast someone who looks and sounds exactly like him but isn't actually him. For me, the low spot of 2016 so far. And that's including Point Break. You have been warned.
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