“Kangaroo Jack” is the sort of useless movie where two guys put $50,000 in a jacket pocket, then put the jacket on a kangaroo they think is dead so they can pose it for photos, and then it turns out to be still alive and it hops away, leaving the two guys to be killed by gangsters who want to know where their $50,000 is. You know, THAT kind of movie.
It’s also the sort of movie where a character makes it past airport security and onto a transatlantic flight with a pair of scissors in his pocket and doesn’t get caught with them until he LANDS — you know, where there are no more metal detectors and no reason to search him. Yes, it’s that kind of movie. The kind where two guys wedge themselves into an airplane lavatory and examine a huge pile of cash, with their dialogue — audible to the entire plane, because apparently they’re SCREAMING it — sounding like off-color bathroom talk. (“I’ve never seen so much green!,” etc.)
This is a a simple-minded comedy of errors in which a lot of errors are made, but few of them are truly comedic. And yet, it is not intolerable. I’m not saying you should watch it, by any means. But if something happened where you HAD to watch it — I don’t know, terrorists forced you at gunpoint, or your little brother made you be his slave for the day — then you’d probably survive.
The stars are Jerry O’Connell and Anthony Anderson, who seem to be genuinely enjoying themselves. They are two life-long friends who wind up in Australia for convoluted reasons I won’t go into, and subsequently lose $50,000 for convoluted reasons I have already gone into.
Christopher Walken has an amusing few bits as O’Connell’s mobster father; otherwise, it is tiresome proceedings all around, with one scheme after another aimed at catching the kangaroo while avoiding the bad guys. Don’t miss the fabulous camel-flatulence scene!!!!!!
C- (1 hr., 22 min.; )
