The Whole Ten Yards

THE WHOLE TEN YARDS

by Jane Louise Boursaw

PG-13 (for sexual content, some violence and language). 99 minutes. Warner Bros Pictures. Directed by Howard Deutch. Written by Mitchell Kapner and George Gallo.

Bruce Willis and Matthew Perry team up again for “The Whole Ten Yards,” a sequel to their 2000 hit comedy, “The Whole Nine Yards,” starring Willis as Jimmy “The Tulip” Tudeski, a professional hit man who moves next door to an excitable dentist named Nick “Oz” Oseransky (Matthew Perry).

In this movie, Jimmy is retired and living quietly in a beachfront bungalow in Mexico, light-years away from his former life. Thanks to falsified dental records supplied by Oz in the first movie, Jimmy faked his own death and now spends his days roasting chickens and manning the vacuum cleaner. Wife Jill (Amanda Peet) is a novice assassin who has yet to pull off a clean hit, though not for lack of trying.

Their domestic bliss is threatened when Oz shows up, begging them to help rescue his wife Cynthia (Natasha Henstridge) – Jimmy’s ex – who’s been taken hostage by the Hungarian mob they battled in the first movie. Jimmy couldn’t be less interested, but is forced to take action when newly-paroled mob boss Lazlo Gogolak (Kevin Pollak) and his dim-bulb goons show up to flush him out of his hideaway. The whole gang soon lands in L.A. for a cat-and-mouse game of bickering and backstabbing.

While the first movie was not a particularly inspired project, at least the script was witty and the characters quirky. The actors clearly enjoyed working together. In this movie, you can practically hear them begging the director to end the madness. The dialogue is tediously unfunny and the script contains none of the wit that made the characters so enduring and spirited in the original film.

This film is more interested in the mayhem – contract killings, exploding cars, wacky stunts -- and the production team is clueless about how to make any of it funny. Originality? None. At one point, Perry asks for a “Check!” in a restaurant after something bad happens. In another scene, he “accidentally” leaves his dentist’s laughing gas on a patient too long. In yet another, he and Willis wake up in the same bed together after some heaving drinking. Perry kisses Willis on the head, thinking it’s his wife. Gay jokes ensue.

Even the tiny bit of chemistry that Willis and Perry possess can’t pull off these tired gags. I should have taken a cue from their promo appearance on ABC’s “The View” the day of the film’s release. Even their real-life banter was disjointed and awkward.

While Willis is still parlaying the same smirky character he’s built a career on (which audiences seem to love), Perry isn’t the least bit funny. He stumbles through the film in a Jerry Lewis-like parody – clumsy, inept, stumbling over chairs and walking into doors. The slapstick bit doesn’t work. It makes you wonder if the production team was even paying attention during the filming.

Pollack’s Godfather-inspired character is musty, and there’s nothing remotely amusing about his character’s habit of shooting people who tick him off. The only somewhat unscathed character is the lovely Amanda Peet, who although a bit demented, is the most charming hit-woman you’ll ever meet. But Peet, Willis’ star power, and a fun musical score by John Debney aren’t enough to save this market-driven nightmare.