Movie Review: ‘Entourage’

The boys are back in the long-awaited feature film version of HBO’s hit comedy series Entourage. Four years after the show aired its season finale, the cast and creative team were finally able to work out the behind-the-scenes details to bring Vinnie Chase, Ari Gold and the rest of the eclectic cast of characters to the big screen. 

When we last left Ari (Jeremy Piven) he was given an opportunity to immediately end his retirement with an offer to become head of the studio. The Entourage film picks up a short time later, as Ari has accepted the position and his first move as head honcho is to put Vincent (Adrian Grenier) into his first major release. Ari’s loyalty is put to the test when Vincent demands that he not only star in the project, but also helm the film as a first-time director.

Entourage works well as a bloated series finale or better yet: a condensed version of a ninth season. Unfortunately, this doesn’t make for a great big screen experience. Nothing that happens feels large enough to warrant being a feature film and at times is too reserved for its own good.

Doug Ellin, the mastermind behind the show, wrote and directed the film and could have easily went too far over-the-top with the feature outing, but instead went the opposite way and played it too safe. Entourage starts slow by trying to catch up the audience and establish the plot, but yet somehow doesn’t explain any of the side characters that show up, making things very confusing for anyone just jumping onboard for the film.

The best new thing that the Entourage film brings to the table is Haley Joel Osment (The Sixth Sense) as the rich, redneck son of the financier of Vincent’s film – played by an underused Billy Bob Thornton. Osment is clueless and smarmy as he digs into the boys’ privileged lives and causes havoc with his “notes” on the direction of the film, all the while stealing almost every scene.

While the film is ligher on laughs than expected, it does lean heavily on fan favorite characters Ari and Johnny Drama (Kevin Dillon) by giving the characters some of the best lines of the script.

In contrast, Turtle (Jerry Ferrara) has almost no reason to be in the film, since he’s now independently wealthy due to his tequila company, but the character is given a romance with female fighter Ronda Rousey that feels more about showcasing her acting/comedic skills than serving a real plot point. E (Kevin Connolly) has by far the most annoying storyline with the pending birth of his child with his ex Sloane (Emmanuelle Chriqui) that overlaps with a perplexingly bad caper involving two recent female conquests, that don’t take his newfound lady-killer status as very charming.

Fans of the show will enjoy cameos from most of their favorite side characters and newbies will get a kick out of all the Hollywood star cameos, but the Entourage film is surprisingly forgettable. For a series that prided itself on excess, this film is a paint-by-numbers extension of the TV series that never kicks its feature debut into high gear to warrant the upgrade.