Completely Hung Over

I saw a movie about four assholes who go on a bachelor party bender in Vegas and can't remember what they did.

So how come I'm the one who wants to throw up?

Backtracking, you've been here before with me. There's a screen comedy that is a big hit. Critics rave that it's one of the best in years. In this case, even friends, some of them even my age, are recommending it to me. "It's hilarious."

I get suckered in all over again. And hope that, perhaps this one time, they are right and I am wrong.

When will I learn? They are always wrong and I am always right.

To say that "The Hangover" is one of the worst movie comedies of all time is probably too mild a statement. Midway through, I started to long for Jerry Lewis in "The Delicate Delinquent" or "The Patsy." Anything else but this. I have to consider that this film was written with the smallest demographic scope in mind---the 20-year-old slacker. Who else would find this cavalcade of toilet humor amusing? But, lo and behold, I looked around me to see folks who are not 20-year-old slackers having a riproaring time. What the hell is wrong with them?

Or, just maybe, what the hell is wrong with me? I am hoping nothing. I still relish the same comedies that made me laugh when I was a kid. I can watch them over and over and over, never getting tired for a moment. Gigglefests from Billy Wilder, Woody Allen, the Marx Brothers, Preston Sturges, et. al. That was comedy at its pinnacle. Despite the audience, "The Hangover" is comedy at its nadir. The lowest of the lowest of the lowest.

In sheer concept, "The Hangover" is reprehensible at best. Four horrible guys ingest enough drugs and booze to make them totally forget what they did for an entire night. They take enough illegal substance to make Michael Jackson posthumously envious. You slowly discover what the heck happened on that fateful night. One of the guys disappears for three quarters of the movie and he might be the lucky one. The other three morons deal with a baby in the closet, a tiger in the bathroom, a hooker in a wedding chapel, a band of gay Chinese gangsters, and, worst of all, Mike Tyson playing himself. The latter gets a pass on script selection since he can't even read. The rest of them should have their SAG cards torn up immediately. The biggest offender is some lunkhead named Bradley Cooper, who literally emotes with his dimples. Over the closing credits, they finally show you in photos what happened to them on this fateful night. I think it's merely a diversion so you don't read the names of those people responsible for this bowl of vomit.

This is the lowest form of humor that would make Howard Stern's sickest shows look like Allistair Cooke and Masterpiece Theater. Beyond all that, there was not one single character that I had any compassion for. I didn't care that they were lost, missing teeth, or being pummeled by thugs. As a matter of fact, if they had been killed in a car crash on the way to Vegas and concluded with a fifteen minute film, I would have thought my twelve greenbacks were well spent. There's an inherent problem in a movie comedy if you start to root for the villains.

Mercifully, "The Hangover" is about 90 minutes so you can immediately head home and stick your head in a gas oven. I wanted to invite the folks around me over to watch a DVD. Maybe "Bringing Up Baby" or "One Two Three" or "The Miracle of Morgan's Creek." When funny was funny. And nobody ever peed in a fountain.

I'll make the mistake again for sure. Another blockbuster comedy from Hollywood. More rave reviews. And more stone faced silence from me. I'll keep hoping and hoping and hoping that, someday and sometime, I won't be the smartest person in the room.

Dinner last night: Asian treats at Rock Sugar in Century City.