Paul Rudd plays the straight man, while Steve Carell charitably tackles the lonely loser who stumbles into his humiliation scheme, in "Dinner for Schmucks," an uproarious odd-couple remake of Francis Veber's hit French farce "The Dinner Game" (once second only to "Titanic" at the Gallic B.O.). American adaptations of Veber's works have been all over the map, from "The Birdcage" to "Father's Day" (when DreamWorks optioned "Dinner," it too was intended to star Robin Williams). Here, helmer Jay Roach takes the wickedly un-PC premise and renders it positively benign, emerging with a nutty crowd-pleaser in the process.
A tale of new-friend stalkerdom so extreme it makes "The Cable Guy" look tame, "Dinner for Schmucks" mocks its central buffoon as mercilessly as the soulless execs it would scold for doing the same thing. Though not as guffaw-rich as previous efforts by the talents involved, it comes close enough to the mark to please their fans, spelling strong boxoffice appeal if not comic edge.
Paramount Pictures announced today the studio has crossed the $1 billion mark at the domestic box office, making it the first studio to accomplish the milestone this year. This marks the fourth year in a row that Paramount was the first studio to cross that plateau. Something no studio has done before. The studio currently holds the top spot in market share, with box office gross generated from five movies released thus far in 2010.
