The Hangover (**½)

Directed by: Todd Phillips
Starring: Bradley Cooper, Ed Helms, Zach Galifianakis, Justin Bartha, Heather Graham, Sasha Barresse, Jeffrey Tambor
Seen: June 16th 2009

**½ Out of ****

The film starts out with Phil (Cooper) calling Tracy (Barrese), Doug’s (Bartha) fiancée, telling her that they will net be getting married today, and then jumps back 72 hours, to everyone getting ready for the bachelor’s party [very stupidly] two days before the wedding, where Doug’s two best friends, Phil and Stu (Helms), and his fiancée’s brother Alan (Galifianakis), take him to Las Vegas. They mistakenly think that they would only spend one night in Vegas and be back with a day to spare before the wedding. But as we know from the call at the start of the film, this doesn’t happen.

The next morning they wake up in their $4200 a night hotel villa, remembering nothing. They don’t notice the girl leaving the villa just before they wake up, there’s a chicken running around in the villa, a real-life tiger in the bathroom, one chair is still smoking, Stu is missing a tooth, Alan wakes up wearing only a t-shirt, there’s a baby in a closet, and Doug is missing. Gone. Nowhere to be found.

What follows is a who-dunnit, with the guys trying to figure out what transpired on the previous night, since none of them can remember a thing. Phil has a hospital tag around his arm, Stu, wants to figure out what happened to his tooth, Alan carries the baby, who he’s christened Carlos, around wherever they go, and everything just keeps on getting more bizarre by the hour.

The film is not for the light-hearted, as it does not squirm away from dirty jokes and crass language. It is not very visual however, and the only nudity shown in this film (restricted 16SLN) is when a woman breastfeeds her baby, and when a naked man assaults the friends. The breastfeeding bit is a quick flash, with the film getting a few laughs of the reaction of the men seeing this, instead of exploiting the woman. Funnily enough there is not a strip-club scene, which is refreshing, as that would have ridden the clichés in a bit too hard.

What I felt through the film was that the trailer advertised something that was going to be more hectic, more in-your-face, more fast-paced than what I got. The film felt slightly long-winded at stages, with the pace only picking up for a next comedic setup again. Even though the film had many funny lines left for the film, it once again felt that most of the funnies were used in the trailer, to lure us unsuspecting victims into the cinema. It is a good movie in its class, but overall not great, just amusing. But know one thing, be prepared for some uncomfortable situations should you choose to see this as a date movie.