Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay really knows its audience. I guess the only question is, would you want to know its audience? Purile from start to finish, with a success rate on its jokes somewhere in the 40 - 60% range, and desperate to shed the shackles of its own contrived storyline, Harold & Kumar has real trouble picking up where the original left off four years ago.

That's not to say there aren't highlights, but that's exactly what they are: Highlights, amid a collection of other jokes and situations that don't work. It's almost as if better ideas were left behind in favor of raunchier ones.

The premise is simple but effective. Harold (John Cho) and Kumar (Kal Penn) are getting ready to fly to Amsterdam so Harold can swear his passionate love for a neighbor he barely knows (Paula Garces). At the airport, they bump into Kumar's old girlfriend (Daneel Harris), who's about to marry a politically-climbing Texan.

On the plane, Kumar is mistaken for a terrorist when an old white woman sees him lighting up his bong in the lavatory. Mayhem ensues and, having offended a dimwitted Homeland Security agent (Rob Corddry), the boys wind up in Guantanamo Bay.

Gitmo is not a major component of this film; Harold and Kumar spend roughly five minutes of screen time in Cuba because, as the title points out, they escape from Guantanamo Bay. But once they're back on the mainland, they figure the only way to clear their names is to butter up the politically-climbing Texan marrying Kumar's old flame, since his father apparently has the President's ear. Now if we just knew who had his judgment. And grammar books.

A tedious road trip movie commences after the jailbreak, and for the better part of half an hour or more, nothing remotely funny happens. And I gotta tell ya, I've never been happier to see Neil Patrick Harris in my life. When the former Doogie Howser shows up, as he did in the first Harold & Kumar movie, business picks up. I think he's probably better in this film, really shooting for the moon as a hyper-macho, mushroom-craving sex addict version of himself.

But the respite is short lived. Eventually, this movie has to resolve itself, even though anyone who's seen either one of these movies will tell you they're better the less direction they have.

There are some jokes that work here, as we mentioned before, but not enough to make Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay a must-see. I think they tried to make too many extreme jokes, forcing them into a smarter, less obvious original concept.

Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay

Starring John Cho, Kal Penn and Neil Patrick Harris

Directed by Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg

Rated R

Review by Colin Boyd

April 25, 2008