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I love this movie so much

I'll tell you why so serious

A Disappointing Continuation

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

"Without a Paddle" (2004) is a comedy/adventure about three old friends who fulfill a childhood pact by venturing into the Northwest wilderness to solve the mystery of D.B. Cooper, an unidentified man who hijacked an airplane in 1971 and parachuted out with a large sum of money. Will they solve the mystery? Will they even get back alive? I remember seeing the trailer at the time and was really excited about seeing this film because I love lost-in-the-woods type adventures, but I was somewhat disappointed. I've seen it twice since then and liked it better than my first viewing, but it's still far from great. It's basically just a fun adventure flick with various lost-in-the-woods shenanigans.It starts off pretty good and gets lame in the mid-section, but the final act is decent. I appreciated the camaraderie of the three friends (Seth Green, Matthew Lillard and Dax Shepard), the hip soundtrack, the excellent guest appearance of Burt Reynolds and the awesome New Zealand locations. The two hippie chicks in the woods aren't anything to get too excited about, but that's a matter of taste. It's worth checking out if you like adventure-in-the-woods flicks.The film runs 95 minutes.GRADE: C+ (almost B-)

Comedic version of Deliverance where three childhood friends set out into the woodlands of America to search for a lost briefcase filled with money. The film is actually light on humour and high on sentiment. The themes are hammered into us, and are actually just spoken out loud. "Life, that IS the treasure". Despite this, when it is funny it gets some big laughs. All the scenes are episodic, with the trio meeting a threatening bear, some hillbillies, a mountain man, and some hippies in a tree. The film relies too much on the men being uncomfortable with homosexuality. Burt Reynolds shows up to pay homage to Deliverance, but doesn't completely embarrass himself or shame the film. Perhaps the wig and make-up helped. I'm always going to laugh at stoned animals so it had that going for it. The locations were often stunning, which helped in the long pauses between jokes. Quick and enjoyable, it never really angered me and it kept me interested.

This is the story of three friends (Green, Lillard, Shepard) from the big city of Philadelphia who go canoeing together out in the woods and mountains of Oregon State after the death of a friend, Billy. Billy was obsessed with going there to search for the unaccounted-for $194,200 out of the $200,000 that famed airliner highjacker D.B. Cooper parachuted with quite possibly to his death in 1971 $5,800 of his marked ransom loot was found in 1980. Canoeing down the Columbia River, the trio soon finds that their canoeing experience goes wrong..., both horribly and hilariously wrong, as the river turns dangerous, and they have encounters with the crazy mountain men (Burt Reynolds) plays who live near the river. Without a Paddle 9/10

When I first saw the television ads for this movie, I thought it looked like another of the countless dumb comedies Hollywood seems to crank out these days. I certainly had no intention of paying to see it in the theater, and really had no inclination to even rent the DVD when it came out. So it wasn't until it showed up on HBO, and there was absolutely nothing else on, that I half-heartedly decided to give it a look. Imagine my surprise when I found out how genuinely funny it really is! Not only funny, but a comedy with a real heart, some incredible scenery, and a good storyline to boot. Just about everyone in it was perfectly cast, and you could really believe that the three main characters had been friends since childhood. I found the idea of three boyhood friends searching for the treasure of D.B. Cooper as adults quite intriguing, and well played out in the film. And Burt Reynolds was a hoot as the enigmatic "mountain man". I have since watched "Without A Paddle" several times, and even bought the DVD. The DVD cast commentary is quite funny, and you can tell they had a great time making the movie. All in all, a very funny movie - probably one of my favorite comedies of the past couple of years. Give it a look, if you haven't already. You might be pleasantly surprised.