'Step Brothers' is a good idea that doesn't deliver

Perhaps Will Ferrell should take a step back from his movie-making career. After the run-of-the-mill sports comedy “Semi-Pro,” Ferrell is back in front of audiences this summer with “Step Brothers” – a good concept that doesn’t deliver. The audience is thrown into the world of two middle-aged losers who still live at home with their parents, for a reason that’s never really made clear. While they are neither the brightest nor the most mature adults, there is never an explanation of why we are supposed to sympathize with these guys. As a result, their antics get tiring quickly, and you ultimately feel bad for the parents.

Ferrell is Brennan Huff, a 39-year-old guy who lives at home with his single mother Nancy (Mary Steenburgen, “Elf”) and doesn’t work or do anything useful with his time. Dale Doback is played by John C. Reilly (“Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story”), a 40-year-old who lives at home with his single father, Robert (Richard Jenkins, “Rumor Has It”), and also doesn’t work or do anything useful. When Nancy and Robert’s whirlwind romance results in marriage, Nancy moves into Robert’s place with her son Brennan, making Dale upset. Neither of the two slackers likes each other, and each tries to make the other’s life a living hell, until they both begin to understand they are more alike than different and this new arrangement can be made to work.

The premise is, for the most part, the entire movie. The attempts at humor are pushed too far by the extreme behaviors and language of the characters, creating an uncomfortable disbelief in what’s happening on screen. The funniest parts of the film have the least outlandish and rude behaviors, when a modicum of innuendo is created. It’s not that rude humor can’t be insightful and hilarious, but this is no “Superbad” or “South Park.” It’s a story supposedly based in the real world and given a surreal quality by the hard-to-believe characters. A subtle cameo by Seth Rogan (“Knocked Up”) steals the scene from the other two comedians.

There are a few laughs intermixed within the lunacy of the story, when the behaviors are so foolish you can’t help but laugh. But this film makes the humor in “Dumb and Dumber” feel like high art in comparison. Watching two goobers be themselves can only entertain for so long, and “Step Brothers” proves over an hour is too much.

Rated R for crude and sexual content, and pervasive language.