Entourage, over the course of its eight seasons, found little to put in the way of its characters. Regardless of what happens in an episode, no matter what obstacles are put in front of this gang of men, they would invariably find themselves on a rooftop, toasting to their latest success. The same mindset dominates this movie, which is essentially a 104-minute episode of the series. It stretches out a general lack of conflict over a feature length runtime, creating an experience even more tedious and trying than the average episode of this lackluster show.
The film opens with the gang) headed to a boat where Vinnie (Adrien Grenier) is partying after the rapid collapse of his marriage. On the boat, they get a call from agent-turned-studio-executive Ari Gold (Jeremy Piven), who wants Vinnie to star in the studio’s latest tentpole release. Vinnie says that he’ll only take the role if he’s also given the chance to direct the film. The movie jumps ahead months, with the project about fifteen million dollars short of being completed. Ari Gold seeks more money from the movie’s co-financier, and he is soon saddled with the co-financier’s son Travis (Haley Joel Osment), who seems intent on wrecking the film.
This would be a reasonably interesting movie if there were anything interesting at all about Vinnie Chase. But there isn’t. He is a character that cannot do any wrong. The most intriguing narrative possibility would be the movie he’s directed turning out to be a disaster, or even just flawed. That way, there might actually be some conflict in all of this. But we know that Ari’s cause is righteous. We know that Vinnie is really some sort of artistic genius, despite the fact that nothing shown in this film supports that premise. And so just as with the TV series, there is absolutely no doubt where this movie is going.
The infallibility of its lead character stretches out to encompass the rest of his gang. No one actually has any problems. No one really has anything to address. Erik (Kevin Connolly) is basically stymied by his having too much sex. Turtle (Jerry Ferrara) is now independently wealthy, and his main problem is that he misinterprets the advances of MMA fighter Ronda Rousey as an attempt to do business. Johnny Drama (Kevin Dillon) is mostly worried about getting cut out of Vinnie’s movie. He’s supposed to be really good in it, and expects to win awards.
No one in the cast looks particularly worried for anything that happens. It isn’t really worth getting worked up over any of this. There are no crises in these films, even though a lot of this involves running around and yelling. None of the primary actors look like they care. Adrien Grenier has always a terribly limited actor, and presenting him as a genius filmmaker feels like a mistake. Jeremy Piven is able to salvage a few scenes with excellent delivery, but this film is still all about regressing the character to the cartoon that it was on the show. The rest of the cast barely stays awake for their line deliveries.
Entourage could be praised for maintaining the tenor of the show even as it made the transition to feature film. But that would be pretty ridiculous. There’s nothing to gain in bringing the lackadaisical, at times openly misogynistic storytelling to the big screen. This film could have told a story of these boys growing up, of them finding a way to look beyond the artificiality of Hollywood. Instead, the film submerges itself in artificiality, with these older men kept playing young boys who have nothing to lose.
My Rating:
