Hall Pass 2011

Tom Long, Detroit News: The film is rarely funny, pointedly tasteless (as if that's new), usually embarrassing and always bad. Read more

Glenn Kenny, MSN Movies: Hall Pass is such a tiring and dispiriting enterprise in and of itself that using it as a potential springboard to contemplate why the Farrellys no longer 'matter' ... well, it just seems not to matter. Read more

Manohla Dargis, New York Times: Once the funny and not-so-funny start to flow, you might not care, though it would be nice if the Farrellys did care about the banality of their images, just a little. Read more

Joshua Rothkopf, Time Out: Hall Pass is a hilariously unnaughty movie; you know exactly where it's going. Read more

David Edelstein, New York Magazine/Vulture: A gross-out comedy about the perpetual immaturity of the American male that has, amazingly enough, a mature perspective. Read more

Keith Phipps, AV Club: Though the film never balances the grown-up stuff with the gross-out gags, it suggests the Farrellys might be able to do mature after all. Read more

Bill Goodykoontz, Arizona Republic: It's crude, for sure, relentlessly so, but it's also just dumb and, when it tries to get something close to serious, kind of depressing. Read more

Wesley Morris, Boston Globe: Bobby and Peter Farrelly have brought water to the arid desert currently calling itself American film comedy. It's a drink spiked with enough crudeness to cause a nasty bout of dysentery. Read more

J. R. Jones, Chicago Reader: The idea has been spun out to its fullest comic potential and the ultimate endorsement of monogamy is even more predictable. Read more

Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune: It's secondhand, vaguely resigned material. And while Sudeikis has some talent, he's not yet ready to co-anchor a feature comedy. Read more

Peter Rainer, Christian Science Monitor: Peter and Bobby Farrelly are gross-out artists in transition. Read more

Christy Lemire, Associated Press: The Farrelly brothers continue to strain desperately for their gross-out glory days with Hall Pass, their latest "comedy" -- and, yes, that word is in quotes for a reason. Read more

Chris Vognar, Dallas Morning News: Guys can be desperately pathetic creatures when it comes to the opposite sex. Read more

Lisa Kennedy, Denver Post: "Something about Mary" seems a lifetime ago. Read more

Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly: Hall Pass, a light comedy of horny marital woe from directors Peter and Bobby Farrelly, makes a novel statement about the sex wars: It says that they're essentially over. And that the guys - in case there was any lingering suspense about it - have lost. Read more

Eric D. Snider, Film.com: The Farrellys hedged their bets on whether to take marital infidelity seriously, when what they ought to have done is go all-out with the vulgar, one-dimensional slapstick, and leave it at that. Read more

William Goss, Film.com: The joke is supposed to be that it's sad to see these guys so desperate for a lay, but in truth, it's even sadder to see the brothers this desperate for a laugh. Read more

Todd McCarthy, Hollywood Reporter: The gross-outs stick out in the Farrellys' spotty new comedy. Read more

Betsy Sharkey, Los Angeles Times: Mildly amusing or marginally offensive is about as good as it gets. Read more

Christopher Kelly, Fort Worth Star-Telegram/DFW.com: Any time a movie needs to resort to two sequences involving unexpected bowel moments for laughs, you know you're in trouble. Read more

Rafer Guzman, Newsday: There's something about Hall Pass that feels grosser than the usual Farrelly brothers comedy. Read more

David Denby, New Yorker: Another chapter in the endless saga of American male infantilism. Read more

Stephen Whitty, Newark Star-Ledger: It wastes a lot of energy to very little effect. Read more

Scott Tobias, NPR: The Farrellys have a distinct touch that carries their dubious premise across. Read more

Elizabeth Weitzman, New York Daily News: Ever catch yourself thinking, "Man, I wish beer commercials lasted just 104 minutes longer"? Read more

Lou Lumenick, New York Post: An occasionally funny comedy with slow stretches that has directors Peter and Bobby Farrelly returning to their trademark gross-out humor. Read more

Rex Reed, New York Observer: Not only disgusting and unendurable, but filthy and boring, too. Read more

Carrie Rickey, Philadelphia Inquirer: I liked this movie better when it was called The Seven-Year Itch. Read more

James Berardinelli, ReelViews: Some of the material in Hall Pass is just plain gross, but some of it is damn funny. Read more

Richard Roeper, Richard Roeper.com: Nothing new from the Farrelly brothers, but a mild recommendation for the handful of big laughs. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: A problem with "Hall Pass," I think, is that both Owen Wilson and Jason Sudeikis are affable, and the movie wants us to like them. Read more

Peter Travers, Rolling Stone: Everything feels forced. Nothing kills laughter faster than trying too hard. Read more

Andrew O'Hehir, Salon.com: Funny, often savagely so. Read more

Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle: The funniest stuff doesn't grow naturally from the story or characters, but feels appended, thrown on as afterthought, like a condiment, to add a little flavor. Read more

Dana Stevens, Slate: Traffics in a brand of misogyny so puzzling that it can only be analyzed by examining the film's raunchy jokes at close range. Read more

Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star Tribune: "Hall Pass" captures the thrill that grown men get from a dirty joke and sustains it for almost the whole picture. Read more

Joe Williams, St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Like the middle-aged dads in this flaccid fiasco, "Hall Pass" is a decade behind the curve of what's happening. Read more

Rick Groen, Globe and Mail: Why do the Farrellys huff and puff and hem and haw and meander through a full third of the picture before the premise even clicks into low gear? At least the answer isn't long in coming: They don't have clue one where to go with it. Read more

Linda Barnard, Toronto Star: The Farrellys, once masters of the funny script, now seem to have no time for outrageous plots or the killer dialogue we loved them for. Read more

David Jenkins, Time Out: The usual string of hackneyed and largely laugh-free set-ups involving vulgar chat-up lines, hash brownies and a mad, jealous guy with a crowbar, all seemingly purpose-honed to appeal to devotees of 'The Hangover'. Read more

Claudia Puig, USA Today: Perhaps if this had been a saucy French sex comedy, it might have taken off. But in the hands of directors Peter and Bobby Farrelly, it's a clunky non-starter. Read more

Andrew Barker, Variety: Those 1990s gross-out kings, Peter and Bobby Farrelly, are finally growing up, even if that maturation is visible only in highly relative terms. Read more

Nick Pinkerton, Village Voice: What once came naturally now seems like trying too hard, as the Farrellys face their own mid-life crisis. Read more

Ann Hornaday, Washington Post: Haphazardly conceived, phlegmatically paced, lazily filmed and punctuated with gratuitous moments of sexual and scatological slapstick.. Read more