The Brothers Solomon are a pair of socially inept siblings raised in Antarctica by their doting dad (Lee Majors, of Six Million Dollar Man fame). But when Pops falls into a coma, the boys decide that the only way to wake him is to fulfil his desire for a grandchild. Unfortunately, their previous attempts to find girlfriends have proven disastrous. Could artificial insemination be the answer? You're unlikely to care as this excruciatingly unfunny comedy slouches towards its interminable end.
Like Will Ferrell and Mike Myers before him, writer and star Will Forte has hopped from Saturday Night Live to the silver screen. Sadly, that's where the resemblance ends, because he and co-star Will Arnett (of Arrested Development), couldn't raise a laugh on celluloid if you pumped the multiplexes with nitrous oxide. The Brothers Solomon presents itself as the bastard child of Knocked Up and Dumb & Dumber, but lacks both the heart of the former and the grand set piece gags of the latter.
"EXCRUCIATINGLY UNFUNNY"
Arnett and Forte, with their plastic countenances and toothy smiles, are weirdly reminiscent of the squeaky clean kidnappers of Michael Haneke's Funny Games, and their attempts to wring laughs from embarrassing social gaffes ("Are you ovulating right now?" Arnett asks a potential date) are more likely to give you the screaming abdabs than the giggles. It's depressing to watch Kristen Wiig (who stole the show in Knocked Up as Katherine Heigl's grumpy boss) relegated to a straight role, while the brothers sweat and strain for laughs. Poor old Lee Majors, who might prove a rewarding actor in the right career-revival project, barely even gets to say a line. Direction is undistinguished, and the editing leaves far too much room for laughs that never arrive.
The Brothers Solomon is out in the UK on 2nd November 2007.