Dinner for Schmucks (2010)

There's a particular kind of Hollywood studio comedy that you clock within the first ten minutes. You know the beats, you know the misunderstandings are coming, you know the lead is going to have a change of heart somewhere around the hour mark. Dinner for Schmucks is exactly that kind of film, and it doesn't pretend otherwise. The question is never really whether it's going to surprise you. It's whether it's going to make you laugh enough to forgive it for not trying to.

The premise is borrowed from the French film Le Dîner de Cons: ambitious corporate climber Tim, played by Paul Rudd, is invited to his boss's annual dinner where the guests each bring along the most eccentric oddball they can find, the joke being entirely at the oddball's expense. His plus-one ends up being Barry, played by Steve Carell, a wide-eyed IRS worker with a passion for creating elaborate dioramas out of dead mice. Yes, taxidermied mice. Dressed as historical figures. It is exactly as strange as it sounds, and the film knows it.

What follows is a parade of increasingly chaotic set pieces, social disasters, and compounding misunderstandings. Barry blunders into Tim's life like a wrecking ball wrapped in a beige cardigan, and watching Carell commit entirely to the role is genuinely something. He's fearless in a way that carries the whole film. There's no winking at the camera, no self-conscious mugging. He plays Barry as a man of absolute sincerity, and it's that sincerity that makes the best moments actually land. The scene where Barry first encounters Therman, a creep played with unnerving conviction, is properly hilarious. Proper laugh-out-loud stuff.

But here's the problem: the film is nearly two hours long, and it absolutely should not be. The second act drags like a wet coat. Subplots pile up, gags get repeated with diminishing returns, and the emotional beats that are meant to give the whole thing weight feel bolted on rather than grown organically from the story. The friendship between Tim and Barry is supposed to develop into something genuine, something that makes you reconsider who the real idiot in the room is. It gets there, sort of, but you feel every minute of the journey. A tighter edit, half an hour shorter, and this could have been a much sharper film.

Paul Rudd does what Paul Rudd does, which is be charming and relatable while occasionally being a bit of a knob, and he's perfectly fine here. The supporting cast adds some colour, though none of them get enough room to really breathe. There are flashes of something more anarchic and weird trying to push through, and when the film lets itself be properly surreal, it's at its most enjoyable.

It reminds me a bit of the Focker films, that same broad comedic energy built around an increasingly absurd spiral of social catastrophe. I've reviewed both Meet the Parents and Meet the Fockers, and Dinner for Schmucks sits comfortably in that same territory, though it's probably a notch below both at their best. It shares the same DNA without quite the same comedic efficiency.

Look, this isn't a film you put on because you want something to think about. It's a film you put on because it's Friday night, you've had a long week, and you want something mildly silly that requires nothing of you. On those terms, it more or less delivers. Carell alone is worth the watch, and there are enough genuinely funny moments scattered through the mess to justify sitting through it. But you'll forget most of it by the weekend, and the parts you do remember will probably be the bits that didn't quite work.

Silly, uneven, and overstuffed, but with enough laughs to make it worth a rainy afternoon. Three stars.

Rating: ★★★  | Year: 2010  | Watched: 2026-02-17

View on Letterboxd →

Where to watch

Watch in the UK
Stream: Amazon Prime Video · Paramount Plus · Paramount+ Amazon Channel · Amazon Prime Video with Ads
Rent: Apple TV Store · Rakuten TV · Amazon Video · Google Play Movies
Buy: Apple TV Store · Rakuten TV · Amazon Video · Google Play Movies
Physical: Amazon UK · Zavvi

Watch in the US
Rent: Amazon Video · Apple TV Store · Google Play Movies · YouTube
Buy: Amazon Video · Apple TV Store · Google Play Movies · YouTube
Physical: Amazon US

Affiliate disclosure: Movies With Macca may earn a small commission on purchases or subscriptions started via these links. It costs you nothing extra.

Related on Movies With Macca

More from Jay Roach: Meet the Fockers (2004) · Meet the Parents (2000)
More with Paul Rudd: Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy (2004) · Knocked Up (2007)
More from the 2010s: Wonder (2017) · Beautiful Boy (2018) · The Witch (2015) · What We Do in the Shadows (2014)
More comedy: The Eagle (1925) · The General (1926) · Americana (2023) · The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! (1988)