Harold & Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay

NEW YORK (CNS) -- A potentially acute satiric adventure, "Harold & Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay" (New Line/Mandate) is, much like its predecessor, 2004's "Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle," overwhelmed by sophomoric excess.

Drug-addled slacker Kumar (Kal Penn) and his slightly more motivated friend, Harold (John Cho) -- the Cheech and Chong of the new millennium -- are on their way to Amsterdam to visit Harold's one true love, Maria (Paula Garces), when they're mistaken for bomb-toting terrorists. Quickly consigned to the titular detention camp by Homeland Security zealot Ron Fox (Rob Corddry), they just as quickly escape when some real extremists make a break for it.

Conveniently discovering a group of Cuban refugees about to set out for Florida, the pair hitch a ride on their raft and make it back to the States. Anxious to clear their names, they head for Texas where Kumar's ex-girlfriend, Vanessa (Danneel Harris), is about to marry uptight, obnoxious but politically well-connected Colton (Eric Winter).

Along the way, they attend a "bottomless" party and patronize a house of ill repute. Stumbling on a Ku Klux Klan meeting in the woods, they take cover, only to have a drunken Klansman relieve himself on their hiding place. They also get high at every possible opportunity.

As these misadventures suggest, co-writers and directors Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg's buddy sequel revels in the salacious and the scatological while glorifying drug use, which is all the more unfortunate since there are some inspired elements in the film.

Corddry, bungling and utterly insensitive, personifies the potential dangers of the U.S. war on terror. Neil Patrick Harris, of "Doogie Howser, M.D." fame, reprises his role as a gonzo version of himself. And the main characters' surreal climactic encounter with President George W. Bush manages to be both satirical and sympathetic. But then it's back to the frat house antics and all this gets -- shall we say -- wasted.

The film contains graphic and frequent rear, upper-female and full-frontal nudity; sexual activity; some aberrant, pervasive rough, crude and crass language, including at least 100 uses of the f-word, seven uses of profanity, and sexual and graphically scatological humor; drug use and references; a prostitution theme; and a pornography reference. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is O -- morally offensive. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is R -- restricted. Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian.

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Copyright (c) 2007 Catholic News Service/U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops