Lame 'Kickin' It' wanders aimlessly
The whiny comedian Jamie Kennedy does more of his idiot b-boy shtick in "Kickin' It Old Skool ." He's just as harmless here as he was in 2003's "Malibu's Most Wanted," but the movie is scarcely as bold, even though it makes similar attempts to send up the limits of race. All "Old Skool " wants is to be -- being good or, more crucially, being funny are merely incidental.
Kennedy plays a man-child named Justin . After a 20-year-coma following a break-dancing accident, he's awake and ready to resume his 1980s adolescence. But it's 2006. Time to discover Internet porn and that some African-Americans use the N-word as a term of endearment. The movie never gets around to playing with the idea that the '80s are still with us, and it's not because the filmmakers are pressed for time. This is an eternal 108 minutes, full of gags about vomit, urine, and indecent exposure, but no useful satire.
There is a goal, though. To keep his parents from losing everything to pay for his outstanding medical bills, Justin rounds up his old move-bustin' crew and enters a televised dance contest with a $100,000 prize. Like Justin , these three are in their 30s and a little pathetic, although Aki (Bobby Lee , who is pretty amusing) has a good cubicle job.
The boys show their newly non-vegetative pal how to be with a woman: The tubbiest one (Aris Alvarado ) straps on a bra and endures a group fondling. This is in preparation for getting Justin back together with his girlfriend (Maria Menounos ) from two decades ago. She's engaged to the spiteful host (Michael Rosenbaum , Lex Luthor of "Smallville ") of the dance contest.
"Kickin' It Old Skool" is probably as tolerable as it can be for a comedy with no obvious creative aim. You can imagine the crew cracking up on some outtake reel, which honestly is what this movie feels like. The actors, fittingly, can't be embarrassed: not Debra Jo Rupp and Christopher McDonald as Justin's parents or Vivica A. Fox as a gold digger. Maybe they thought the movie, with all its stale pop nostalgia, was headed straight to VH 1, which is where it belongs.
Wesley Morris can be reached at wmorris@globe.com. For more on movies, go to boston.com/ae/ movies/blog. 