Perhaps the Farrelly brothers realize “There’s Something About Mary” will always eclipse their later efforts, but “Hall Pass” suggests they will never direct another good movie. The lame jokes, ridiculous circumstances and lack of humor burden the film as it sags throughout its runtime. While “Hall Pass” has some positive qualities, its defects make it nearly unbearable.

“Hall Pass” follows the conventional formula of a romantic comedy. Rick (Owen Wilson) and Fred (Jason Sudeikis) portray two married men with excessive libidos and the vocabulary of stereotypical frat boys. After their antics irredeemably humiliate their families, their wives (Jenna Fischer and Christina Applegate) offer them a hall pass—both men have a week free from the obligations and consequences of marriage. The women also consider the benefits of married life, especially as attractive men compete for their attention. The plot forces Rick and Fred to reevaluate their attitudes about women and identify their true feelings for their wives.

The acting in “Hall Pass” is the film’s strongest attribute. All four leads desperately try to hold together a movie flawed in nearly every other aspect. Wilson and Sudeikis exude an earnest likability. Their cluelessness is hilarious. They select Applebee’s as a place to meet single women. Smaller supporting roles, such as Stephen Merchant portraying an uptight English friend, grant the film some of its funnier lines.

As a comedy, though, “Hall Pass” fails. The jokes frequently flop, the dialogue is either too thin or overwrought and the plot feels too contrived. Everyone’s attitude toward the hall pass itself is ridiculous. A friend of the wives, played by Joy Behar, introduces the pass as a solution to marriage crises backed by psychology. Her ad-hoc explanation for its effectiveness is eye-roll inducing. Other characters, like the women Fred and Rick pursue, accept it without question. The characters live in a world of optional responsibility. Rick and Fred’s three cute kids are conveniently absent for eighty percent of the movie. The film uses the children to show the strengths of their marriage and completely ignores the children afterword. As in every romantic comedy, the leads must win back the ones they love after a series of obstacles. In classics like “Annie Hall,” Woody Allen confronts his neuroticism and the streets of Los Angeles. In “Hall Pass,” Rick and Fred must defeat an enraged hipster, who assaults them with a crow bar and a pistol. The prolonged encounter with the deranged youth destroys the last shred of credibility left in the film.

Even at the best moments of “Hall Pass,” I did not laugh as much as I would have liked to. Neither the antics due to marijuana-spiked brownies nor jabs at nouveau-riche snobbery could salvage this film from its own wreckage. For the most part, others in the audience seemed reluctant even to chuckle. As a whole, avoid “Hall Pass.” Better jokes are likely found in your chemistry book.