"Hall Pass"

By Matt Duncan
Coastal View News

It is a truism that even the best of marriages are not always a walk in the park. The onus that comes with such a commitment can of course be challenging to bear. It can be easy to imagine how things could have been different.

These things are true of marriage, and unfortunately, they are also true of “Hall Pass”. Despite a likeable cast and a promising premise, this movie is not altogether easy to endure.

Rick (Owen Wilson) and Fred (Jason Sudeikis) are two middle-aged boys who are each suffering from marital doldrums. Although their wives—Maggie (Jenna Fischer) and Grace (Christina Applegate), respectively—are beautiful, loving and kind, the eyes and minds of Rick and Fred are nonetheless prone to wander. They imagine what their lives would be like if they were single; they picture droves of gorgeous women throwing themselves at their feet. They seem to think that, if only they were free to play the field, they would have endless scoring opportunities.

Maggie and Grace cannot help but be embarrassed by the outward manifestations of Rick and Fred’s active fantasy lives and deluded swagger. However, confident that their husbands will in fact strike out if they are given a chance to swing away, Maggie and Grace decide to give them a “hall pass”. Rick and Fred’s hall pass comes in the form of a week off from marriage—a week to do whatever they want without any consequences. Rick and Fred gratefully accept their hall passes, fully expecting to get laid more times in a week than they had in all of the prior decade.

But, even with the help of their equally pathetic forty-something friends, Rick and Fred quickly realize that picking up beautiful women is not as easy as they remembered. They go to all of the wrong places and make all of the wrong moves. In fact, their most noteworthy accomplishment turns out to be the dizzying pace at which they are able to repel women.

Nonetheless, by the end of the week Rick and Fred manage to turn their luck around. After virtually reinventing the wheel, they finally move in on a couple of good-looking (if not altogether savory) women. Meanwhile, Maggie and Grace are, much to their surprise, finding new suitors of their own. And so the wives quickly realize that their husbands are not the only ones who were longing for some kind of change. Rick, Fred, Maggie and Grace must each figure out what is more important: dedication to their respective spouses, or the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to take advantage of a hall pass.

Unfortunately, “Hall Pass” is not, in general, funny. Nor is it particularly interesting, thought-provoking, true-to-life, or amusing. The concept behind “Hall Pass” could have made for a worthwhile movie, not of course because any thoughtful couple would consider a hall pass to be a productive marital experiment, but because this movie had a chance to play on the complicated psychology that comes with being married. But directors Bobby and Peter Farrelly turn an interesting concept into a painful and annoying march through emotional and intellectual bankruptcy. It could have been funny to see how being off the market causes Rick and Fred to foster delusions of sexual grandeur. But it wasn’t. There could have been a compelling moral in the way each spouse comes to realize that the costs of playing the field outweigh the benefits. But there wasn’t.

Maybe my hopes were too high for this movie (though that is tough to imagine). But I cannot see how my hopes could have been so modest that they would not have been let down by “Hall Pass”. Even actors who are normally reliable came up short. Owen Wilson, for instance, is normally the height of funny. But in “Hall Pass” he’s not. So it is at times painful to watch Wilson, with his boyish grin and high-pitched voice, trying to turn an intrinsically flat script into something dynamic and charming. Unfortunately, Wilson’s climb is too steep.

By my count, “Hall Pass” has one very funny line (at the very end) and a handful of somewhat funny moments. This does not add up to a good comedy.