Good Luck Chuck

September 21st, 2007 by James Cook | Source: The Moving Picture

Directed by: Mark Helfrich
Written by: Josh Stolberg (Based on the short story by Steve Glenn)
Starring: Dane Cook, Jessica Alba, Dan Fogler, Lonny Ross, Ellia English

Score: 3/10

Many stand-up comedians try and break out of the comedy clubs and onto the big screen, few are able to get to the leading status. Many often fall short and pop up periodically in supporting roles, which isn’t a bad thing; there are a lot of comedians that fill the supporting role characters perfectly. This is Dane Cook’s second attempt at a leading role and it’s just as big of a bust as his previous effort Employee of the Month.

I think Dane Cook gets a lot of flack he doesn’t deserve. I’m by know means a huge fan of his, some of his material is really funny, he’s just one of those comedians that you have to take in small doses. So the idea of having to sit through a 90 minute Dane Cook vehicle doesn’t really excite me.

Chuck (Dane Cook) is a dentist and someone who seems to have trouble committing to a woman. When he was younger he was at a birthday party and a girl put a hex on him for not wanting to make out with her. The hex involved him never finding true love, now as much as the concept is ridiculous I can’t fault the movie for starting out like this. Liar Liar is a very funny movie and it starts out with a similar premise involving a wish - it just happened to have Jim Carrey behind the jokes.

Along for the ride is Chuck’s buddy Stu (Dan Fogler) a plastic surgeon who works primarily on giving women bigger breasts. The two soon realize that every woman that Chuck has sex with ends up falling in love with the next man they meet. This ends up being a major problem since he’s just met the girl of his dreams, Cam (Jessica Alba).

Good Luck Chuck suffers from one of the worst one-trick pony scripts I’ve seen in a long time. The problem lies in each character; every one of them is one dimensional and not funny. You have to wonder if Dane Cook or any comedian for that matter would devote an entire set to just a couple of jokes, I’m guessing no. Cam is nicknamed “Murphy” for “Anything that can go wrong will” as she tries to do her best three stooges impression in almost every scene. After about the second time that she knocks over a table it gets old, it doesn’t help that the filmmakers decided to have her stab and electrocute Chuck as well as destroying the roof of his convertible all in the span of five minutes.

Stu is no better as we’re berated with boob jokes every time he’s on screen. Screenwriter Josh Stolberg seems to think that that’s all it takes to make a good sex comedy. As for Chuck he seems to wine about his problem a lot but doesn’t seem to take it to heart that much, as he’s completely fine with having sex with anything that moves. It’s no wonder he’ll never find true love.

There’s one scene that got me to laugh and it involves Chuck putting his curse to a test by having sex with a very obese woman, too bad the scene last’s about three minutes. There’s also some jokes that Cam’s stoner brother (Lonny Ross) dishes out, but it’s still you’re basic stoner comedy which has been done countless times.

Overall, Good Luck Chuck is just another crappy comedy with a few big names attached. Any other cast involved in this garbage would have had it bypass the multiplex and sent straight to the DVD shelf.