Dungeon Masturbation: Your Highness Reviewed

Better than the Oscars: James Franco and Danny McBride
By MATTHEW SINGER

Danny McBride, James Franco and David Gordon Green play Dungeons & Dragons: This is an unassailable premise. So we were concerned when Your Highness didn't screen by WW print deadlines. We were right to worry.

Your Highness

WW Critic's Score: 28

"Kenny Powers goes medieval." That's probably how Your Highness star and co-writer Danny McBride pitched this stoner fairytale, which essentially transplants his foul-mouthed dickhead ballplayer from HBO's Eastbound & Down into Middle Earth and sends him on a quest for redemption. Alongside James Franco and the tightly corseted bosoms of Natalie Portman and Zooey Deschanel, it sounds like a can't-lose proposition. Of course, the idea of pairing the Shaun of the Dead guys with a CGI alien voiced by Seth Rogen must've looked great on paper, too. At least Simon Pegg and Nick Frost can blame Paul on the absence of their usual directorial accomplice Edgar Wright. Even with David Gordon Green—who last directed McBride and Franco together in the hilarious and underrated Pineapple Express—behind the camera, Highness whiffs on what should've been an easy hit. What gives?

Not a lot of effort, that's for sure. No one involved seems willing to expend much energy toward actually making the film worthwhile. Three-fourths of the jokes are rooted in what I can only assume is an old improv comedy axiom: "If you can't think of anything funny to say, just say 'fuck.'" And the other 25 percent involve a severed Minotaur cock. In this case, a computer-generated Seth Rogen would've likely helped. R.

Your Highness opens wide Friday; find showtimes here.

WWeek 2015

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