It's an odd state of affairs when a movie carries a relatively strong creative pedigree and yet seems to have been brushed aside by the creators as if they knew full well how savagely it would be received by critics and audiences alike. Such is the case with Bucky Larson: Born to Be a Star, which comes from Adam Sandler's production company and has a script cowritten by Sandler, plus a cast of eminently accomplished actors who either didn't know they were slumming it in a stupid, raunchy comedy, or for some reason didn't care. That said, just because it's stupid and raunchy (which it really is), there are germs of redeeming tidbits in Bucky Larson, including the above-mentioned performers along with the shear depth of its stupidity and raunch. Nick Swardson, a longtime Sandler cohort and a very funny presence in his many other movie and TV appearances, plays the title character under a ridiculous bowl haircut and behind a pair of front teeth that seem ripped from the jaws of a giant mutated gopher. He's an Iowa farm boy with hayseeds permanently stuck in those choppers. He knows nothin' from nothin', but vows to make it as a modern-day porn star after a weirdo TV party gives him evidence that his parents were industry icons in the 1970s, thus making him born to a lineage despite his crazy look, crazy talk, and crazy brain. The other obstacle he faces is a piece of fleshy manhood that's, well, a little on the small side, to put it mildly. In a sequence of events so stupid and raunchy that they do have the necessary ingredients for some measure of possibly drunken hilarity, it turns out that his massive under-equipment and contingent hair trigger gain him exactly the kind of stardom he knew he was born to (his shortcomings make other men feel better about themselves). It seems kind of silly to lament that everyone involved didn't make more of an effort to put Bucky Larson in a higher class since everything about it is so utterly low class. But with a cast that includes Edward Herrmann (Bucky's dad), Stephen Dorff (a rival porn star), Christina Ricci (Bucky's forlorn girlfriend), Don Johnson (a washed-up porn director), and the talented Swardson himself, it feels like the sloppiness of the whole affair is just plain lazy. People will find some genuinely funny moments in Bucky Larson if they're able to even start in on it (a scene involving "stolen" food and Bucky's psychotic roommate Kevin Nealon is definitely a laugh riot), but it's likely that this movie will only find life in the home market of a select few who revel in the underdog nature of a particular brand of cinematic stupidity. --Ted Fry