Grumpy Old Men Lemmon, Matthau Are At It Again `The Odd Couple Ii'

Movie review XX 1/2 "The Odd Couple II," with Walter Matthau, Jack Lemmon. Directed by Howard Deutch, from a script by Neil Simon. 97 minutes. Several theaters. "PG-13" - Parental guidance advised for brief strong language, some adult situations.

Expecting "The Odd Couple II" to be true to the tone and characters of Neil Simon's original 1968 "Odd Couple" is a bit like expecting to find in "Psycho 2" some vestiges of Hitchcock's original Norman Bates, but I went in to the screening with that mindset anyway.

It wasn't an entirely unreasonable expectation. After all, Simon wrote the screenplay for this sequel, and since he created the slob-character Oscar Madison and the clean-freak character Felix Ungar, you'd think he'd be more protective of them. What remains of the two 30 years later, however, are all the ticks and none of the motivation, just some fossilized plot contraptions and traces of the old Simon dialogue trapped in amber.

But as "The Odd Couple II" finally sidles into its pace, the dinosaur of a story rises again, bellows about chronic pain and age afflictions, and entertains just consistently enough to recommend.

Since appearing in the very funny, original "Grumpy Old Men," Matthau and Lemmon have revitalized themselves as a cottage industry, despite recent lame efforts like "Out to Sea" and, for Lemmon, "My Fellow Americans." In "Odd Couple II" the two old pros earn back some of the trust of their faithful audience by toning down the slapstick and relying on Simon's pen to bring them through.

Simon obviously didn't spend any restless nights coming up with the new plot. When Oscar's son (Jonathan Silverman) announces plans to marry Felix's daughter (Lisa Waltz) in California, the two old codgers leave their East Coast haunts and reunite in L.A. It starts out badly as they trip into each other at the airport, then Felix's bag gets left behind, Oscar burns up their directions to the wedding, and the film unabashedly settles in to become a road movie. Their rental car gets destroyed, they get mixed up with importing illegal immigrants, they wink at two roadhouse girls (Christine Baranski and Jean Smart) and accept a very slow car ride from a longevitist (Barnard Hughes).

Most of this stretch is consistently funny, but Matthau and Lemmon could have been playing just about any character. There is very little here to justify that it's Felix Ungar and Oscar Madison in that slow-moving car. Felix and Oscar just happen to be their names; everyone knows it's really Matthau and Lemmon.

As in the original film, Matthau's performance as Oscar is the one that touches most effectively; his twist of a phrase or emphasis on a syllable still makes him a joy to watch. The guy should win an award for just being relaxed enough to leave that old-growth forest coming out of his ears.

Lemmon has the tougher role of the hypochondriac nuisance Felix. He never seems to really sell that he has once again put on Felix's skin. It's a personality that one can imagine would only worsen over time, but Lemmon seems too nice, too accommodating to be the type of man that anyone would kick out of their house. The reflexive self-loathing that consumed Felix in the first "Odd Couple" rarely gets a chance to be seen; director Howard Deutch is too busy shooting his planes, trains and automobiles to allow that. Simon also has Felix using a lot of profanity - which seems entirely against his type.

But even if "Odd Couple II" isn't a continuation of Oscar and Felix's story, it certainly is of Lemmon and Matthau's. These T-Rexes of the Hollywood Geritol set prove that dinosaurs can once again roam the earth.