School-age wimps fighting for revenge is not a new filmic concept.  School-age nerds hiring someone to help them remodel their image in not a new concept.  Mashing the two together into a film where school-age wimps hire someone to help them with their revenge is also not a new concept.  Just because something is not a new concept however doesn't mean that it won't be funny.  Recycled material and ideas can, absolutely, be funny.  Drillbit Taylor, starring Owen Wilson and newly released to DVD, simply isn't.  It could have been, there are numerous examples of similar films that work brilliantly, Drillbit Taylor just doesn't. 

Directed by Steven Brill (who directed the less-than-funny Adam Sandler flicks Mr. Deeds and Little Nicky), the film focuses on three stereotypical high school freshman outcasts - the fat kid who likes to rap and talk like a "gangsta," Ryan (Troy Gentile); the super-thin nerd-looking kid, Wade (Troy Gentile), and the basic complete dweeb, Emmit (David Dorfman).  These three stereotypes, at the very beginning of their high school career find themselves set upon by two more - the bully, Filkins (Alex Frost), and the bully's friend, Ronnie (Josh Peck).  Unable to stand up for themselves, the wimps decide to head out to the internet to find themselves a bodyguard.  They sort of succeed, finding "Drillbit" Taylor (Wilson), a homeless man who lies his way into the position in an attempt to swindle the kids.

As the film plods along, Wilson teaches the wimps various foolish, but never funny, methods of trying to defend themselves, none of which pan out, prompting Taylor to pretend to be a substitute at the school in order to watch over the children.  Predictably, Taylor meets a love interest at the school and truly falls for the kids, stepping back from his master swindling plan (which, to be fair, he was forced to expand in order to help his homeless brethren). 

Wilson, charismatic actor that he is, makes the movie watchable, even if he is unable to generate laughs.  As a slacker surfer-type, Wilson isn't extending his range in the movie, nor does he ever seem to be exerting himself in any way.  It says much about the film that despite that, he is the best part of the picture.  The rest of the characters are so poorly sketched out that they never evoke any sort of emotional response from the audience. They are only ever flat, fuzzy, paper cutouts, their lack of depth and clarity make them wholly impossible to root for or against.