Joe Dirt
By Danny Sarnowski

David Spade’s latest comedy Joe Dirt is as warm and surprising as it is funny. Stuck with the billing of “From the producing team that brought you Deuce Bigelow and Big Daddy,” it wallowed in poor box office and initially poor reviews. To be sure, there is plenty of pure potty humor and lowbrow, cruel, insulting comments, but there are also moments of comic genius. Spade is slowly positioning himself as the most human of all Saturday Night Live alums. Adam Sandler is bizarre and moronic, Chris Farley was a ball of obnoxious energy, Rob Schneider will do anything for money, and Will Farrell is on another planet. Spade’s work on Just Shoot Me and his hilarious turn as the voice of a royal llama in The Emperor’s New Groove have really showcased his sarcastic, quick-witted humor, but they’ve also shown his vulnerable side. David Spade is king of the wimps.

Joe Dirt is the tale of a young boy left by his parents at the Grand Canyon when he was 8 years old. Instead of being terrified, young Joe looks on the bright side of things and keeps his spirits high as he searches the country for his parents. There are many obstacles in Joe’s path along the way, not the least of which is the fact that he doesn’t know his parents’ last name. After bouncing around from foster family to foster family and from juvenile delinquent centers to the streets, Joe gets some solid clues to his family’s whereabouts.

Joe’s journey across the country brings him into contact with a host of weirdoes who include: Kid Rock as a white trash motor head, Christopher Walken as a bizarre (imagine that) janitor, Dennis Miller as a shock-jock disk jockey, Rosanna Arquette as an alligator farm owner, Joe Don Baker as a drunk hillbilly, and Carson Daly. His story also involves atomic bombs, alligator wrestling, septic tanks, meteors, the witness relocation program, and a brief incarceration with a cross-dressing, homicidal maniac. Joe’s cheery demeanor and awful looks land him on a popular L.A. radio show so the host can make fun of him. What happens instead is that the show’s host (Miller) and half the country become interested in his sordid tale and want to help him resolve his issues and find his folks.

Spade sports a huge mullet wig throughout the entire movie, and takes several shots at his masculinity, fashion sense and intelligence. Spade creates Joe Dirt as a dirty, weak, trashy loser, but one with such a great attitude and such determination that somewhere along the line you stop laughing at him and start rooting for him.

7 February 2002