I love a good comedy, but unfortunately good comedies are few and far between. Generally you have the inane teen comedies (which admittedly back in the 80’s were pretty funny, but in the 90’s and 00’s are mostly lame), action comedies, and romantic comedies. There are good and bad in each group, but certainly more that lean to the side of bad. It seems that very few writers today can deliver a laugh without the use of fart, poop and crotch jokes. Of course in the defense of this style of humor, it can be quite funny when used properly. It’s only deadly dull when it’s overused or leaned on to carry a film. What makes the finding of a good comedy so difficult lies in the lost art form known as ‘the trailer’. While most can sell a bad film to even the most discerning of audiences, what hurts is when a bad trailer sells a good movie short. Such was the case with Paramount’s “Without a Paddle.” When I first saw the trailer for this new ‘comedy’, I was initially turned off by what seemed was going to be one of those deadly dull comedies.

I had pretty much forgotten about the film until the DVD made its way across my desk. I looked at the cover and was mildly intrigued enough to watch it based on the cast alone.

“Without a Paddle” stars Seth Green, Matthew Lillard and Dax Shepard as friends who reunite after the death of the fourth member of their childhood group. When they were kids, they all had dreams of being adventurers. They swore they would one day try to track down the elusive D. B. Cooper, the infamous robber who parachuted out of a plane and disappeared forever. But their lives took them in very different (and unsatisfying) directions. It was only this fourth friend who went on to become a noted world traveler. With the remaining trio together again, they decide to set out on their quest in their friend’s memory.

The main reason I was so intrigued by the cast, was that I have been a fan of Seth Green since his days on “Buffy The Vampire Slayer.” Granted, most of his projects outside of that series were questionable, but there is an inherent likeability about the actor and I generally enjoy his work, even if the surrounding film is less than stellar. Recently I caught him in episodes of the hysterically funny “Greg the Bunny”, thanks to its recent DVD release. Matthew Lillard, on the other hand, I used to detest. Through no fault of his own, it was more the characters he played, which were at best, annoying. And it always seemed to be the same characters. It wasn’t until his note-perfect performance as Shaggy in the otherwise horrible “Scooby Doo” films, that I noticed some credible talent. Dax Shepard is still a relative unknown to most audiences, but I became a fan of this guy after watching several episodes of Ashton Kutcher’s “Punk’d” series. Shepard was often in the forefront of the gags and jokes Kutcher played on Hollywood’s elite and was willing to do ANYTHING (including shopping naked in a clothing store around Jessica Alba). The guy was dead-on funny and I had hoped to see him make the leap into feature films.

Once I watched “Without a Paddle”, I realized that the guys who made the trailer should be fired, and found that it was actually a movie I would recommend to a lot of my friends. The humor was a bit uneven, with some of the laughs being genuinely funny while others were more at the absurdity of the plot, but the bottom line is that I laughed. Sometimes quite hard. Sure there were some poop and crotch jokes (though thankfully no fart jokes), but they were few in number. I’ll also grant you that most of the situations, which include running from bears and drug-dealers were over the top, these scenes offered a lot of laughs.

The DVD release for “Without a Paddle” offers up two commentaries for the film, the first by director Stephen Brill. This was a fairly good commentary, but even better was the second one by Brill, along with Green, Lillard, Shepard, Abraham Benrubi and Ethan Suplee. This commentary, which also offers up a video view of the speakers occasionally throughout the film, is almost funnier than the film itself. You’ll also find a decent behind the scenes featurette and 13 deleted scenes with optional commentary. Finally, there are several MTV trailers promoting the film.

I expected “Without a Paddle” to be a silly comedy with little going for it, and instead found it to be a only a mildly silly movie with a lot going for it.

Directed by: Steven Brill
Starring: Seth Green, Matthew Lillard, Dax Sheperd, Ethan Suplee, Burt Reynolds
Extras: Audio Commentary by Director Steven Brill, Video Commentary by the Cast and Director, MTV’s “Making the Movie”, 12 Additional Scenes with Optional Director Commentary, 6 MTV Interstitials, Theatrical Trailer
Specifications: Widescreen Enhanced for 16x9 Televisions, Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound, 2.0 Surround
Studio: Paramount
Release Date: 1/11/2005
Region 1
MPAA Rating: PG-13 (For Drug Content, Sexual Material, Language, Crude Humor and Some Violence)
Website

We'll give Without a Paddle a B.