Wild Hogs DVD Review [3]
Posted by Neil Borenstein on 08.17.2007
Some effort could have made this movie a lot better!
Wild Hogs DVD Review
Cast
Tim Allen: Doug Madsen
John Travolta: Woody Stevens
Martin Lawrence: Bobby Davis
William H. Macy: Dudley Frank
Ray Liotta: Jack
Marisa Tomei: Maggie
Jill Hennessey: Kelly Madsen
Tichina Arnold: Karen Davis
John C. McGinley: Highway Patrolman
Movie/DVD Information
Genre: Action/Adventure/Comedy
Region: Region 1
Number of Discs: 1
Studio: Touchstone Home Entertainment
DVD Release Date: August 14, 2007
Run Time: 100 Minutes
Rating: PG-13
Specs: Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound – English, French and Spanish Language Tracks; French and Spanish Subtitles; Widescreen 2.35:1 (enhanced for 16x9 televisions)
The first thing that stands out about the movie Wild Hogs is the superb cast. Four stars in Tim Allen, John Travolta, Martin Lawrence and William H. Macy headline the movie. At least two of them – Allen and Lawrence – are known for their comedy, and the other two are not too shabby in that department when the role calls for it. All four of them, however, are tremendous actors for any genre of film.
Add to the fact that the supporting cast has Ray Liotta, Jill Hennessey, Tichina Arnold and the hot-as-hell Marisa Tomei, and there are some expectations for this film to be at least moderately appealing, if not a complete blockbuster.
Unfortunately, Wild Hogs does little more than wash out.
Allen, Travolta, Lawrence and Macy play four middle-aged men seemingly on the verge of a mid-life crisis with stagnant lives, careers and families.
Allen plays Doug Madsen, a dentist with a loving wife, Kelly (Hennessey), and a son, Billy. Doug is afraid he is losing the admiration of his son, who he fears considers him lame. Plus, his job is turning out to be a complete bore. Bobby Davis, played by Lawrence, has taken a year off from work as a plumber in order to write a how-to book that is nowhere near getting off the ground. He is reminded of that fact by his working wife, Karen (Arnold), who wears the pants in the family, as well as his two daughters, who show him a lot less respect than his wife. Macy plays Dudley Frank, a single computer programmer who has no idea how to act around the ladies and has even less of an idea on how to be normal in any other everyday activity. Finally, Woody Stevens, played by Travolta, was at one point a successful businessman. But he now finds himself broke and on the verge of a divorce from his supermodel wife.
These guys decide that their lives have turned from wild to mundane. And at the pushing of Woody, who has the least to lose at this point, they agree to hit the road toward the Pacific on their motorcycles. Essentially, they are taking a roadtrip to nowhere. Comprising the Wild Hogs, as noted by patches made by Doug’s wife plastered on the back of their leather jackets, they toss away all their inconveniences and hit the road – just to live life and forget about the adventure that had been lost from when they were younger.
On their journey, they first encounter a highway officer, played by John C. McGinley, who believes they are gay and would like to join them in certain homosexual looking endeavors. This stuff, essentially, is rather pointless.
After escaping him, they find themselves at a bar run by the Del Fuego’s, an actual biker gang that doesn’t appreciate the existence of suburban “posers” in their establishment. Jack (Liotta), causes some trouble with them and forces them to leave the bar after taking Dudley’s bike. This doesn’t sit well with Woody, who goes back to the bar by himself, does a little damage to the Del Fuegos’ bikes and steals back Dudley’s motorcycle.
Woody tells the rest of the Wild Hogs that he talked the Del Fuegos into giving in to his demands through the threat of legal action, but he soon learns that the damage he caused actually exploded into something bigger than he expected.
Woody is determined to get the gang moving since he knows the Del Fuegos will soon be after them, and the Wild Hogs end up in the small town of Madrid. They wind up at a diner owned by Maggie (Tomei), who becomes the conquest of Dudley. And it’s also there that the Wild Hogs must finally start standing up for themselves and those they care about in an attempt to counter the Del Fuegos’ attempt at revenge.
In the end, the Wild Hogs turn out to not be the real posers after all.
Wild Hogs, however, does end up being a poser of a real movie since what had all the potential in the world to be a really good time turned out to be a lazy effort out of the writers and director Walt Becker.
While there were definitely those inevitable laughs throughout the movie, as a cast such as this one would have no matter how bad of a film they were in, it just doesn’t live up to the hype.
I think this movie is really lacking in structure. There are a lot of scenes that could have been cut to allow for more time in other areas of story development. The entire part with them camping and skinny-dipping could have been avoided, as the only point of those two parts of the movie was to bring out homosexual comedy. It didn’t add anything to the film, though, and had nothing to do with the plot.
The movie also handicaps the actors and doesn’t allow them a lot of leeway to perform to their potential. I felt Lawrence was severely held back considering his comedic style. And that was a big disappointment for me since I’m a huge fan of his and expect a lot more from him. I also think Travlota was severely under-used.
This movie definitely could have been a lot better. To be fair, I did get a few good laughs out of it and maybe the cast did put some high expectations on the film that a story such as Wild Hogs could probably never live up to. I do believe that this move had all the potential in the world to be a true hit with sequel ability. But this movie just wasn’t enough to satiate the interest it provoked. It fell far from its expectations and turned out to be little more than just slightly entertaining.
The Audio
Volume was a bit inconsistent at times, but it was nothing too terrible. The dialogue, as well as the sound of the bikes and environmental noise, comes off fine on the DVD.
Score: 8.0
The Video
In a movie of this nature, with the open road such an important element, the capturing of the landscape is extremely important. The visuals are very good looking and the scene selection comes off very nicely, even if the story that accompanied it wasn’t as great.
Score: 9.0
The Extras
Promos Prior To Film:The Nightmare Before Christmas hitting 3-D theaters this October, The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause and The Invisible coming to DVD soon. Sneaks Peeks in Bonus Features section include these, in addition to ABC Family, Ugly Betty: Season One and Grey’s Anatomy: The Complete Third Season promos.
Audio Commentary: The film may be viewed with audio commentary from director Walt Becker and writer Brad Copeland.
Bikes, Brawls & Burning Bars: The Making of Wild Hogs: Your basic behind-the-scenes feature for the making of a film. There are interviews with cast and crew about the making of the film, most notably from director Walt Becker and the actors. They pat each other on the back and talk about how much fun they had, the motorcycle training for the actors, the comedic nature of the actors, fighting with a bull and each other and blowing things up. 16:18
How To Get Your Wife To Let You Ride A Motorcyle: Stunt Coordinator Jack Gill gives tips to guys on how to convince their women to let them get a bike. 2:48
Alternate Ending/Deleted Scenes: May be viewed with commentary from director Walt Becker and writer Brad Copeland
Alternate Endings – This ending involves the homosexual highway patrolman instead of the guys at a beach. 1:34
Acute Molar Abscess – Doug has a dentist “emergency.” 1:14
Chili Pepper Abuse – The Wild Hogs see members of the Del Fuegos messing with folks at the Chili Festival, including a man in a chili pepper costume. 1:19
Outtakes: A bunch of, well … outtakes. Go figure. 2:33
The 411: Unfortunately, a film that had so much potential considering its cast fell pretty much on its face. Instead of solid comedy being the base of a well-developed storyline of four middle-aged men hitting the open road to find themselves, Wild Hogs is just one big cluster of poor writing and even worse directing with a few decent laughs mixed somewhere in between. They sadly missed the boat on this movie. As far as the other DVD features, the bonus features cannot save this puppy. I would not recommend buying it, at least not until you can find it on sale for something in the $6.99 range.
