Dude, Where's My Car


I saw Dude, Where's My Car at the Emporium in Bangkok, Thailand. While I enjoy outrageous low-brow comedy, I was pleasantly surprised to see the mostly Thai audience rolling along with laughter with me, at what were clearly American pop-culture centred jokes.

The film exemplifies a slacker generation, poking fun at them, while also crediting them with abilities that might not be obvious at the outset but can result in saving the Universe (solving the Rubik's cube is non-trivial). Like other movies of the genre (Road Trip, for one), it is essentially a series of gags strung together around a vague (and in this case, outrageous) plot line.

The story begins when Jesse (Ashton Kutcher) and Chester (Seann William Scott) wake up after a night of wild debauchery not having any memory of what happened the night before. They soon discover that their car is missing and as they go about trying to find it, they are confronted by space aliens and space nerds looking for the "continuum transfractioner", and a transvestite who wants her suitcase full of money back. They realise that finding the car will not only answer all these questions but will also redeem in the eyes of their girlfriends who think they are "sucky boyfriends" for forgetting their anniversary.

Some of the funnier scenes include the "and then?" gag; the tie-in between the opening scene where Jesse and Chester discover a lifetime supply of pies to the final scene; the ostrich sequence; and the scene where Jess and Chester kiss each other. You can easily see most of these gags coming, which, for some strange reason, made it all the more fun.

Dude, Where's My Car is one of those movies you can enjoy if you check your brain (completely) at the door. It's definitely not for anyone who can't put aside their judgement and have to rate it in relation to other movies. I found the gags funny and was laughing a fair amount and I still smile when I think back to them.


Movie ramblings || Ram Samudrala || me@ram.org