The Hangover 2009

This isn't a favorite type of movie for me. The stereotypical male behavior that's presented in media surrounding chicks and drinking is stupid to me and I've never understood the appeal or appreciated it being passed on as an okay norm to both male and female youths. It's unrealistic for these guys to even be friends really, but then again; it's also so often presented that it's acceptably normal and all in good fun that they be genuinely mean to each other. All that said, the movie did make me laugh a considerable amount. It wasn't anything I'd care about ever watching again, but it wasn't completely awful, and had its entertainment value. At least in this movie trilogy male nudity is shown as well as female; it gets kudos from me on that front. Nothing's turned me off quicker (said for emphasis of course) than hearing a dude go "oh god, I don't need to see that" when it comes to the male form in films, but he would think a woman was overreacting if she felt the same the other way around. And of course, what should quickly become obvious in reading my reviews; I despise cheating being presented casually or as something that doesn't incite serious consequences. Yes, they were drugged to the point of not even remembering their actions later, but still. Let's hope Stu (all of them, just in case) went and got tested before banging anyone, like poor Stu's wifey. Oh, and kudos for testing being mentioned at all. Yes, that's in the second film, but let's just say this review overall covers both the first and second.

"So long, gay boys."

Going into this, I was a little pessimistic. Most likely because this is a comedy film, and I'm worried I'll find it boring and unfunny; that defeats the overall purpose. I don't think that's happened to me yet. At least completely. And I've barely watched that many comedy films yet, either. So, it's needless worrying on my part.

Now, at the same time, I didn't laugh out loud a lot. That's probably due to watching everything by myself, being by myself, with a bit of desensitization. I've found that when I'm with someone, the littlest things seem to make me laugh involuntarily. The kind of laughter you get, generally, not just with films, when it comes to instances you aren't supposed to laugh at, trying desperately to hold it back, not laugh. That makes it tough to determine whether I found a comedy film funny, so even with comedy films, it still comes down to entertainment; was I entertained?

With this film? In a nutshell, yes. It was entertaining to watch; I wasn't slowly getting bored. I can understand how the comedy aspect would be hilarious to people, either overall or in some parts of it, even though I didn't laugh much.

My favorite part/what I liked most about it was probably the lead characters, especially Phil and Alan. That aspect of the writing did a lot for this film. And, of course, the performances by Bradley Cooper and Zach Galifianakis helped with that, too. Mr. Chow (including Ken Jeong's performance) was also up there. Overall, the three leads had good chemistry with each other, which bled into the film/their characters, and that, combined with the writing side of things, ended up with a good result.

Interestingly enough, despite being a focal part of the story in an off-screen capacity, Doug stood out the most. I wanted him to be more present. Something about Justin Bartha's performance gave more of a likeability factor to Doug, wanting more of him, which I hope is the case in the other two films. But I feel like that won't be the case.

Two other aspects that stood out tremendously were the soundtrack and the cinematography (as well as some of the film's editing by Debra Neil-Fisher). The soundtrack was by far the best one I've heard so far out of every movie I've watched. 'Fantastic' doesn't even come close to describing it. And the cinematography was shockingly great; I wasn't expecting it to be, especially for this kind of film. Lawrence Sher did a great job with it.

I haven't read much of what people say about it, but I get the impression that the reception is similar to Tropic Thunder, and if you've read my review for that film, you'd probably guess that I'd disagree with that sentiment for this film, too.

Yes, you're correct. (If my impression is spot-on) this film is overrated. Just like Tropic Thunder. But it's far from bad.

So, overall, this film was pretty positive. Pretty much everything I liked (the story was straightforward, but that's not a negative), which made the whole movie even better.