Dirty Grandpa review: “Repulsive, offensive and terrible”

Dirty Grandpa review: Meet the most offensive, repulsive, most unlikable, disgusting film of the year so far.

Zac Efron and Robert De Niro lead this new R-Rated comedy from Dan Mazar, the talented writer and producer behind Sacha Baron Cohen’s Borat movie, and the director of British comedy I Give It A Year. Mazar takes on his biggest project yet with Dirty Grandpa, a film that heavily relies on constant gross-out humour and multiple mutterings of the word shit, rather than wit.

Efron plays Jason, a successful lawyer who has just bagged a high-profile job at the law firm that his father works for. Unfortunately, there’s been a death in the family, and everyone has united to mourn the loss of Jason’s grandmother, including his grandpa, Dick (played by De Niro). At the wake, it becomes known that Dick has to travel to Florida the following day, but unfortunately has had his driver’s licence taken away from him. Step in grandson Jason who reluctantly agrees to drive Dick down south even though it’s just a matter of days until his wedding to his very highly strung girlfriend, Meredith (Julianne Hough).

When we attended the press screening for Dirty Grandpa, we were greeted with a box of wipes that had the words ‘post-masturbation tissues’ printed across the front. The placement of such merchandise perfectly sums up what Dirty Grandpa offers; obscene, offensive humour that has consistently rubs your face right it. In quite literally the film’s second scene we’re greeted with the sight a full-on, no apologies-offered image of Robert De Niro’s character masturbating in front of pornography. This sets the tone of what’s to come, which is much, much worse. Bestiality, homophobia, relentless sexism are not off-bounds here, and neither is De Niro’s Dick constantly uttering the words fuck, I gotta fuck, I wanna fuck, cock, fuck, shit, cocksucker etc. either. Most of the film’s first two-thirds will have you reeling from the obscene content, the film-makers obviously going after the shock value that if it was funny the first time, it certainly isn’t for the fourth, fifth or sixth – and it definitely wasn’t funny the first time either. An example of this is Efron’s appearance apparently matching that of a lesbian. Another is Aubrey Plaza’s utterly repulsive slut of a character character whose overactive libido compels her to make every other sentence an inappropriate, unfunny innuendo.

Did we mention that De Niro says fuck a lot?

Before we totally ruin everything by pointing out every flaw with the movie, of which there are so many more, let’s focus on some of the good stuff.

I can’t believe I’m typing this but there is a lot of fun to be had with the film, and most of it comes in the last reel, as Mazar and debut writer John Phillips (who also writes the upcoming Bad Santa 2) try to justify the debauchery of the last 60 or so minutes. When more depth to De Niro’s character is offered it becomes a better movie, and the same for Efron’s too, but the film-makers are so intent on shocking you with their antics that there’s really no time for any kind of character development.

There’s some great comedy and indeed laugh-out loud moments when Efron’s character finds himself locked up for the night, and the two police officers, played by Mo Collins and Henry Zebrowski are a hoot, but even then the laughs border on cliché. There’s a great karaoke scene two-thirds in, and some fun stuff with a shirtless Efron, but even that can’t save this.

Just when you thought De Niro was back on track following Silver Linings, Joy and even The Intern, he ends up in something like this, a film that makes Grudge Match look like Raging Bull. Avoid.

Dirty Grandpa review by Paul Heath, January 2016.

Dirty Grandpa is released in UK cinemas from Friday 29th January, 2016.