Two pranksters, and a brace of hidden cameras, travel across country in this jauntily gross comedy.
Strictly for devotees of degrading pranks and public humiliation, Kitao Sakurai’s “Bad Trip” — a “Jackass”-style road movie belching clouds of poor taste — follows two hapless dreamers from Florida to New York City.
Strapping squalid stunts on the back of a dopey narrative, this hidden-camera Netflix comedy sends Chris (Eric Andre, of the supremely weird “The Eric Andre Show”) and his friend Bud (Lil Rel Howery) on a cross-country quest for romance. Chris has learned that his onetime high-school crush (Michaela Conlin) is working in a Manhattan art gallery, and he plans to declare his still-fervent devotion.
Contrasting the starry-eyed innocence of this goal with the pair’s repellent misadventures en route, the screenplay (by Andre, Sakurai and Dan Curry) concentrates on bathing its leads in as many noxious emissions as possible. Fake vomit, urine and gorilla ejaculate squirt across the screen as our heroes horrify the unsuspecting patrons of a cowboy bar and a zoo, exemplifying pranks queasily fixated on orificial and genital abuse. Bud’s wrathful sister (Tiffany Haddish), whose beloved car the two have pinched, might be murderously in pursuit, but she can take her time: Her prey won’t get very far with their penises stuck in a Chinese finger trap.
However effortful, the movie’s tricks are more likely to activate your gorge than your funny bone. An end-credits reveal of the hidden cameras to the film’s good-natured dupes has a humorous purity that’s unexpected and appealing — if far too late to mitigate the dreck that has gone before.
Bad Trip
Rated R. Did I mention the gorilla ejaculate? Running time: 1 hour 24 minutes. Watch on Netflix.
Source: Movies - nytimes.com
