I’ve never had a hangover that I enjoyed, so why should I enjoy a movie called "The Hangover?" Besides, having had three weddings and not a single bachelor party (one of the more inane parts of pre-wedding debauchery), I hardly saw it as something with which I could easily identify.
And yet, I liked the movie, which opens here today as a fine example of what we used to call "summer movies," films that need not a single minute of extra thought, either while watching or afterward, but still provide pleasant entertainment.
Of course it’s sexist, raunchy and not at all in good taste. But just as there are times when the soul cries out for White Castle, there are times when tastelessness emerges as one of the basic food groups.
Besides, "The Hangover" has an interesting premise, it’s fast-moving, well-acted and often extremely funny. And stay for the credits, because there are out-takes that lift both humor and tastelessness to new heights.
Anyway, Doug (Justin Bartha) is about to be married, so his friends, Phil (Bradley Cooper as a teacher) and Stu (Ed Helms as a dentist), and about-to-be brother-in-law, Alan (Zach Galifianakis, as the butt of most jokes) drive with him from Los Angeles to Las Vegas for a weekend ring-a-ding-ding. They’re also driving his bride’s father’s vintage Mercedes convertible, and Alan notes that his father likes the car more than he does his son.
Understandable, too.
The winning angle to the screenplay, by Jon Lucas and Scott Moore, is that we catch up with the quartet on the morning after, when they discover that Alan bought the wrong kind of recreational drugs and they have no memory of the previous night. Oh, yes: Doug is missing. Re-creating the night before turns into a delightful romp, including a borrowed police car; a debt of $80,000 to a Chinese gambler named Mr. Chow, played by a very funny Ken Jeong; a missing tooth by the dentist; the possibility that one of them got married to a combination stripper-escort named Jade (Heather Graham); a six-month-old baby; and a snarling, unleashed tiger in the bathroom of their suite.
Director Todd Phillips has a fine sense of timing and physical comedy, and the four principals show the ability to mug, take pratfalls and execute most of their lines with skill. And for this film critic, there are times when it’s good to sink to one’s basest instincts.
At multiple locations
-Joe