"I can't believe this is happening AGAIN!" - Ed Helms in The Hangover Part II
"Neither can we." - The Audience
Director Todd Phillips has a punk rock streak. His first project, made while he was still an NYU student, is the shock-documentary Hated: GG Allin and the Murder Junkies. In it an interview subject is about to reveal someone's identity, but stops himself. "Wait, you can't use this in the movie." Okay, we won't, is the response. And, of course, the footage remains in the final cut.
Punk rock filmmaking!
The Hangover, a movie I didn't particularly care for, but also didn't hate, touched a nerve with a lot of people. Bradley Cooper and Ed Helms are charismatic as the everyman joker and uptight dentist tracing the consequences of their uncaged inner animals. The plot is absurd and some scenes are funnier than others, but at least it was a somewhat clever idea.
The Hangover Part II breaks whatever small connection the first film had with reality from the very first scene. It is the same exact movie. And while many of my peers seemed surprised that all the A-listers in this project would agree to this truly lackadaisical script, I knew better.
It's punk rock!
What's a better "screw you" to The Man than to take your half-a-billion-dollar franchise and slum it with a sequel that is so ridiculously stupid that no one could ever take it seriously?
Further proof is the nearly fourth-wall breaking product placement. When a character asks if "anyone wants anything," Ed Helms takes center stage to say "I'll take a Smart Water." I was certain this was a setup for a joke from one of the other characters, or a callback later in the film, but no. It was Punk Rock Todd Philips flipping Hollywood the bird.
Good for him. Bad for the audience looking for a good time.
Now, there are a few laughs to be had in The Hangover Part II. Even though Zack Galifianakis' character has gone from lovable oaf to abyss of idiotic destruction, you can never deny that the man has comic timing. Dude goes into a Buddhist temple and asks "are we in a P.F. Chang's?" To quote Larry the Cable Guy, I don't care who you are, that's funny right there.
The Hangover Part II also has its share of shock scenes - we're still in a cycle of one-upmanship that started with There's Something About Mary - but even all those exposed wangs are rendered flaccid when there's no simply no way to connect with this film on a story basis.
I love to suspend my disbelief (hell, I read comics!) but the absurdity of this whole enterprise renders everything moot. Worse, still: the characters can't seem to care, either. When the newbie to the group (Mason Lee, a budding surgeon and cellist), loses a finger and no one seems to think twice, what was still standing in the movie just collapses.
When Robert Downey Jr. is flip about his lost finger in Kiss Kiss Bang Bang it shows how the desperate characters in that film react to conflicts that would shatter a normal person. The Hangover Part II, which is allegedly all about normal people ("Oh my God, we'll miss the wedding!"), doesn't react because it would take too much effort to think up a new story beat. It's far simpler to just stick to the plan and ape what happened last time.
If you are the type of person who goes to the movies once a year, and you loved the last one, then, sure, you can see this one and have a reasonable night out. But if your life isn't dictated by babysitters or Hollywood's greed, and you really want to laugh, do yourself a favor and see Bridesmaids instead.
