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BY MAGGIE SCOTT

Packed with good-natured vulgarity and juvenile stupidity, the new comedy Step Brothers is like some perverted “Leave It to Beaver” episode.

This free-wheeling parody of blended families has a field day with the fallout from two rational professional adults. They are struggling to make amends for so grossly enabling their grown, free-loading male children who take an instant dislike to one another after Dale’s widowed dad (Richard Jenkins) and Brennan’s divorced mom (Mary Steenburgen) fall in love and tie the knot.

Stuck somewhere in the eight-year-old range of emotional development, the new step-siblings launch a scurrilous, no-holds-barred struggle for dominance. No insult is too low, no prank too disgusting, no argument too nonsensical.

Dale (John C. Reilly) launches the attacks with put downs of Brennan (Will Ferrell) and orders not to touch his drum set. Verbal assaults quickly escalate into pummeling and lethal weapon bludgeoning.

Adding to the parents’ aggravations, the boys are both somnambulators (sleepwalkers) who trash the kitchen, stash the sofa cushions in the oven and indulge in simultaneous, unintelligible mumbo-jumbo as they lurch through the house like demented two-year-olds.

Eventually Dad cracks down, confiscates the TV remote and demands the guys get jobs and go into counseling. This only serves to broaden the scope of their mayhem, as they offend, shock and in general mess with normal people’s minds. Discovering they can achieve a warped sense of solidarity standing up to Brennan’s mean younger brother Derek (Adam Scott), a slick salesman with an unhappy wife who takes a shine to Dale, the guys bond with whacked stunts, Steven Seagal movies and dreams of opening an
entertainment company.

When Dad and Mom file for divorce, the kumbaya crumbles, with the boys blaming each other for the breakup. Brennan vows he’ll make something of himself and be the hero reuniting his mom and Dale’s dad. So, with parting jabs, the brothers go their separate ways.

What will it take for these chronic adolescents to grow up and understand that not only are they brothers, but best friends? Ferrell revels in this kind of “Jack Ass” zaniness, and there is nothing he is afraid of casting in a lurid light in the service of a giggle, snigger or belly laugh.

After you adjust to the pervasive potty mouth and have calmed the urge to leave the theatre, you’ll settle into a wild ride of naughty hilarity that’s hard to resist.

Rated R for crude sexual content and language.
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