Wieners (2008)

An Exercise In Nonsense

Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Wyatt (Kenan Thompson) wants so badly to become a hot-dog-selling employee, gets the bright idea to take his two best friends, Ben (Zachary Levi of "Chuck" fame) and Joel (Fran Kranz, "Dollhouse") cross-country in a self-made hot-dog company promoting car to give away free wieners in order to promote the company that won't hire him. There's also the added benefit of kicking the crap out of a Dr. Phil-like talk show host (Darrell Hammond) who caused Joel to get dumped by his girlfriend when they reach their final destination. Along the way they meet multiple eccentric characters sadly, all of which are much more annoying than funny.This is pretty much a low-rent "Road Trip" clone minus the laughs. It's one of those films where the 'jokes' arn't just devoid of laughs, but their 'punch-lines' can be seen coming from a mile away. To top it off none of the characters are particularly likable enough to care about their so-called 'madcap' adventures. The minutes seemed to stretch for hours, especially during the time that Jenny McCarthy's on the screen (it's just a glorified cameo, yet it felt endless)Eye Candy: An extra briefly shows her tits at a strip-club & two others randomly walk by later in the filmMy Grade: D-

The movie starts well enough: A guy, arguing with his girlfriend, ends up on the show of a thinly veiled Dr. Phil to help work through the relationship. However, this episode has a twist. Some time later, our hero spends his days sitting in his underwear watching and re-watching that same episode. To snap him out of his funk his friend, who just bought a weinermobile, proposes a road trip---to travel across the country and kick the good doctor's ass! The film, however, is unable to keep the momentum going behind this interesting concept and things quickly devolve into crappy physical humor, some running gay jokes, a lewd reference here and there, and some awkward situations that bore more than they amuse. All of which serves as nothing more than an attempt to bulk out the film because clearly the writers ran out of good ideas. The ending is also a somewhat disappointing muddled mess that leaves viewers with the distinct impression that they just lost 90 minutes of their life that they're never going to get back.Former child star & current SNL cast member Kenan Thompson plays the happy-go-lucky hot doggatier Wyatt and greatly outshines the rest of the cast. Despite his best efforts, however, even he can't pull laughs out of this mess. The only two other faces you might recognize in the film are Jenny McCarthy (of Mtv fame) and Darrell Hammond (who plays the thinly veiled Dr. Phil parody). All three perform admirably in their roles. However, the leading man, Zach Levi (aka Chuck on the NBC comedy of the same name) could have easily been replaced with a sack of potatoes in the majority of scenes and nobody would ever have noticed.If you're going to see Wieners, if you watch the first 10 or 15 minutes then fast forward to the last 10 (or, because you're going to probably see this on TV, watch something else for a while) you might enjoy the film.

Where's the mustard… where's the relish… where's the wieners!!! This "movie" is a really lame attempt at a buddy/road trip movie in the vein of National Lampoon comedies. There are a few laughs, all of which come courtesy of Kenan Thompson, but it's easy to be funny when you are firing off jokes every three seconds… literally!!! I like Kenan's work on SNL, but unfortunately his character is not interesting enough to fix this broken Wiener. His character is very annoying and he shoots almost every line in the movie like he's trying to reach the back row of a live audience. Some of his jokes do hit the mark, but suffice it to say… a little Kenan goes a long way! The rest of the film is just okay, but there are a few gross-out scenes that drag down my rating i.e. who needs to see someone pick their butts, belly buttons, etc… and the "spit" scene - YUCK!I'm sure there's an audience for this sophomoric attempt at comedy, but I think even the most juvenile of audiences won't find much to laugh at with this wienie attempt of a movie.

'Wieners' is a budget installment in the genre of teen sex comedies such as 'American Pie' and 'Porky's'.The humor is hit and miss. Some of the gags did in fact tickle my funny bone, but many just fell flat. As the title name would imply, the majority of the humor is centered around sexual innuendo and themes. 'Wieners' was surprisingly less raunchy than I would have assumed, and that actually works in it's favor. The plot is more or less a disposable vehicle for the comedy, centering around a group of friends heading cross-country in a hot dog van to seek revenge on a daytime talk show host.The hijinx and situational comedy encountered on the road trip are, of course, the highlights of this movie.If an median movie is a 5, this is a slightly subpar bit of cinema, yet not a completely wasted effort or a true stinkbomb.4/10 -