SHAWN LEVY

Bil’s rating (out of 5):  BBB. 

USA, 2013.  Twentieth Century Fox, Regency Enterprises, Wild West Picture Show Productions, 21 Laps Entertainment, TSG Entertainment.  Story by Vince Vaughn, Screenplay by Vince Vaughn, Jared Stern.  Cinematography by Jonathan Brown.  Produced by Shawn Levy, Vince Vaughn.  Music by Christophe Beck.  Production Design by Tom Meyer.  Costume Design by Leesa Evans.  Film Editing by Dean Zimmerman.

Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn team up yet again, playing best friends and wristwatch salesmen whose company fires them when their luxury sales items stop being lucrative (people check the time on their phone in the modern world).  Desperate for employment but even more desperate for something to aspire to, these guys have no idea what dinosaurs they are until they scam their way into an internship opportunity at Google, the search engine that is poised to take over the world.  They spend a summer competing with smartphone-obsessed, cynical and uber-competitive twentysomethings looking to be among the 5% of a large group chosen for employment by the company, which is problematic given that they barely know how to operate a computer let alone figure out code. The team of misfits with whom they are assigned at first can’t stand these geezers, but a night on the town with strippers and some life lessons at the crack of dawn soon make them all one big happy family.  The natural camaraderie between the two stars and a few genuinely laugh out loud moments punctuate what is otherwise a pedestrian formula done one too many times: anyone bothered by the familiarity of the plot will doze off immediately, but there are points when Wilson’s winsome charm and Vaughn’s verbally diarrheic delivery manage to keep you in for the long haul.  Not to mention the fact that the youngsters are charming, while Max Minghella’s snotty villain is obnoxious enough to make you want to see him get his comeuppance.  Just don’t be surprised if nothing here actually surprises you.