Richard Roeper, on the TV show "At the Movies", hosted by Roeper and Ebert, called it "horrible" and expressed the view that Green was a poor comedian, going so far as to say that he "should be flipping burgers somewhere". Along with Ebert, he was offended by the numerous "gross-out" gags. Film critic Leonard Maltin shared Ebert and Roeper's views of the film: "Instantly notorious word-of-mouth debacle became the poster child for all that's wrong with movie comedy. Gags include the maiming of an innocent child and a newborn spun around in the air by its umbilical cord—compounded by the almost unimaginable ineptitude with which they're executed."