It’s hard to hate Entourage, the new extended-HBO-episode dressed like a feature film, but it’s easy to feel a little sorry for it.
It clearly doesn’t know, despite the determined partying going on onscreen, that the dude party is over: like the phrase “bromance” (coined in the ’90s) or the garish soft-porn of Maxim, recently rebranded into something new.
Guys doing guy things is only worth watching if there is something else going on, some hint of irony, some tongue-in-cheek acknowledgement that we all need a high-dose injection of testosterone in our lives once in a while.
The HBO series excelled at this in the beginning when it took gentle pokes at Hollywood entitlement as our boys climbed the sticky ladder to success. But Vince (Adrian Grenier), half-brother Johnny (Kevin Dillon), their manager E (Kevin Connolly) and driver Turtle (Jerry Ferrara), once eager puppies, have been somewhat neutered by success. Everyone just looks tired.
Not to worry: the boys’ history is quickly explained in case you didn’t follow the show, which was based loosely on Mark Wahlberg’s early exploits in Hollywood (how loosely, only his priest knows).
The action starts — where else — on a yacht in Ibiza, so there’s no time to wonder where the boobies are at. Vince is celebrating the death of an amicably failed marriage and embarking on his first directing gig, a futuristic remake of the Jekyll and Hyde story. The film is over-budget, much to the dismay of new studio head Ari (Jeremy Piven), who green-lit the project. Funding for the movie is coming from Texas moneybags Larson (Billy Bob Thornton), who proudly proclaims that he never watches the movies he finances. Smart man.
Meanwhile, E is having a baby with his ex (Emmanuelle Chriqri), Turtle makes a play for a UFC star Ronda Rousey and Johnny/Drama is reduced to competing for parts with Chad Lowe and the short guy from Married With Children.
Spot-the-celeb is as entertaining as the film gets. There’s Gary Busey explaining literature to muscleheads; Haley Joel Osment is Larson’s buffoonish son; Bob Saget tries not to sleep with girls from his daughter’s middle school; billionaires Warren Buffet and Mark Cuban make appearances, along with athletes such as Mike Tyson and Russell Wilson, actors Jessica Alba, David Spade, Armie Hammer, Jon Favreau and music icons T.I. and Pharrell. Emily Ratajkowski is Vince’s bland not-quite-love interest.
Wahlberg, acting as producer, manages to plug both his Ted sequel and his Wahlburger’s reality show during his walk-on, a shameless bit of self-promotion that seems right at home in a film about Hollywood.
Greg Louganis sets gay rights back a few years by agreeing to a thankless cameo as former assistant Lloyd’s (Red Lee) future husband, a plot point that pretty much dies on the vine. And the best line in the film occurs after an angry Liam Neeson gives Ari the finger, leading Ari to plead “Hey Schindler, leave no Jew behind!”
But that’s about it. Entourage is destined to join Sex and the City as a smart show that tried to make a big play at the box office but instead reminded us of just how redundant it had become. And by the time the boys do that trademark slo-mo saunter across the red carpet, we’re wishing they’d make a speedier exit.
Entourage screens at International Village.Â
