Our Idiot Brother

Maybe Paul Rudd isn’t meant to be a Hollywood leading man, instead relegated to a career of playing high-profile sidekicks and straight men. Or perhaps he just hasn’t found the right breakthrough role.

Those questions aren’t exactly answered with Our Idiot Brother, a dysfunctional family comedy that again features Rudd trying to keep an uneven script afloat.

Rudd tries to make the most of a lovable loser in the film, finding a certain level of sweetness in a character who is oblivious to the ways in which he almost ruins the lives of those around him. It’s a family in which honesty is not the best policy.

Actually, hopelessly optimistic Ned starts by ruining his own life after selling pot to a uniformed cop in broad daylight. He is released from prison and has nowhere to go. His girlfriend (Kathryn Hahn) has moved on and taken possession of his beloved dog. He doesn’t want to live with his aging mother (Shirley Knight), and his three sisters feel he’s too much of a burden.

So he’s passed around among family members like a hot potato, inadvertently revealing secrets along the way. He somehow manages to break up Liz (Emily Mortimer) and her filmmaker husband (Steve Coogan), lesbians Natalie (Zooey Deschanel) and Cindy (Rashida Jones), and derails the journalism career of Miranda (Elizabeth Banks). His actions make Ned the object of ridicule among his siblings, who fail to see his good intentions.

The key for Rudd and director Jesse Peretz (who also directed Rudd in the wonderful low-budget comedy The Chateau in 2001) is to make Ned a charming and sympathetic presence instead of turning him into an annoying buffoon who becomes the object of condescension. For the most part, they succeed, although his shtick grows tiresome after a while.

The script ambles in predictable directions throughout and needs an edgier or at least a quirkier approach. Then comes the mushy ending, which was the result of post-production tinkering and is almost a complete disaster.

Our Idiot Brother has some amusing moments, with Adam Scott in particular stealing his scenes as Miranda’s sardonic boyfriend. But while the audience gravitates to Ned’s side when it comes to placing blame in the family fracas, the film is too lightweight to justify much emotional investment.

Rated R, 90 minutes.