Comedy / 2011 / 102 min / Rated R
Starring: Bradley Cooper, Paul Giamatti, Mike Tyson
As you probably figured out, it's time for the next guy of the "wolf pack" to get married. So they all decide to go on a bachelor trip together, to enjoy the poor bloke’s last days of “freedom”. Free from the vicious clutches of a smoking hot, loving wife. Another girlfriend of the boys' has an oddball brother with ADHD, who also tags along on the trip, after some mild persuasion.
The Hangover 2
...then takes us on a trip to an exotic location, where three of the boys go out for some beers, while leaving the only normal guy of the bunch behind. We get to see the boys bring out a toast, followed by some time lapse shots of the city skyline. The evening turns to midnight, and the midnight eventually turns into a new day...Wild animals and lost body parts, redux
The guys eventually wake up, in a totally messed up place. During their wild nightly activities, one of them apparently managed to lose one of his body parts. But even craaazier: one of the guys had gone missing entirely! And as they take a look in the bathroom, they’re being greeted by...Hold it... hoooold it...
A WILD ANIMAL!
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| Odd couple. It's now the dentist's turn to get some time off from his fiancée. Doesn't she seem unbearable? Eww! (irony) |
But, hold your horses for a minute. Doesn’t this all sound VERY familiar, after watching first Hangover movie? Well, you guessed right, because it is…
The original The Hangover movie was a tremendous box office success, so a sequel was of course inevitable. I’m guessing the writers were held hostage, forced to script another movie having everything that the first one did. I can almost hear the producer ROAR: “All funny gags, twists and turns from the original Hangover MUST be included in the new one. Then it simply cannot fail…right – right – right?”
J. Jonah Jameson of Spider-Man. (Photo not related to The Hangover Part II. Any resemblance to actual staff members involved in said movie production is purely coincidental.)
They clearly had the urge to get this movie out fast, to please the fans of the 2009 original. Striking while the iron is still hot, so to speak. So, the creative minds behind the wacky first movie didn’t dare (or perhaps even care) to deviate from the formula one bit. Not an inch, not a millimetre (metric system rules!).
Made from a template
They already had the template finished from working with the first movie. Now they just had to change some variables out, in order to make it look like an entirely new flick:“Let’s see here… Last time they went to Las Vegas. Let’s spin the globe, cover the eyes and pick a new destination… Uhmm let’s see what we got here….. Bangkok, is it? Alrighty, then.”
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| "It's a monkey!" |
- Followed by:
“Last time the straight face was getting married, so who’s up next?..... Eeny, meeny, miny, moe… The dentist, oki doki.”
. . . . . .
“So, what wild animal will appear in the bathroom, then? -…Uhhmm.. monkeys are fun, everybody loves monkeys, right? -Fair enough, we'll put a monkey in there….”
Etc...
The Hangover Part 2 - official trailer
The Verdict
Now that the essence of The Hangover is evident as can be, they might as well outsource the scripting of the subsequent 10 movies to Bollywood. Or even more price efficient; use a simple tombola or a random word generator, with the words “tooth”, “finger” and "face tattoo" left out beforehand.At the other hand, if the first Hangover was the caaaziest, funniest thing you'd ever seen, you'll probably find this enjoyable as well. But, if you found the first one more or less on par with your average American college comedy, and not above - you certainly won't find this movie too impressive either.
~theJo