He's just a gigolo but Deuce Bigalow promises you a good ride

The boundaries of good taste have never represented much of an obstacle to Rob Schneider - and the American comedian once again hurdles them with ease in his latest offering, Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo.

'The idea this time was to not censor ourselves,' Schneider says. 'Because, let's face it, today's audiences have seen everything. There's nothing that can shock them. So we thought, 'Let's do something that shocks them'. Everything we did we genuinely thought was funny, but I have to admit that, for the first time, we would sit in a room for whole days with the sole aim of coming up with shocking ideas.'

The results of these brainstorming sessions pretty much speak for themselves: a woman whose nose is a penis; a pimp who eats french fries floating in a toilet bowl; a woman with a laryngectomy who sprays wine through the hole in her neck; and an endless stream of puerile, gross-out gags that would make the Farrelly brothers blush.

Schneider's follow-up to his 1999 hit Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo has come in for plenty of flak, with some critics finding it well beyond the pale. Hong Kong audiences were going to see it for themselves on the big screen - but the promotional posters soon disappeared and now it's available only on DVD.

'Racist', 'misogynist' and 'spurious' are some of the brick-bats that have been hurled at the film. Roger Ebert dismissed it as 'aggressively bad', before handing it a rare zero-star rating.

Schneider is unapologetic, and says the humour isn't malicious. 'I wouldn't do anything that's mean-spirited,' he says. 'There are some things that I just think are funny, but are in bad taste - it's not politically correct. But I make fun of myself. And the French and the Brits and the Greeks and the Italians - everyone.'

Schneider decided to write his sequel after being urged to do so by fans of Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo, a surprising box-office and DVD sales success.