Ashton Kutcher as Jack Fuller and Cameron
Diaz as Joy McNally in "What Happens In Vegas", which opened in the U.S. and
Canada today. The film is released by 20th Century Fox. (Photo: K.C.
Bailey)
THE POPCORN REEL FILM REVIEW/"What Happens
In Vegas"
Neurotic Newlyweds: Can't Live With Each
Other, Can't Kill Each Other (For $3 Million)
By
Omar P.L. Moore/May 9,
2008
"What Happens In Vegas", which opened today
across North America, is a glossy, colorful comedy, with the bright lights of
Sin City and big buildings of the Big Apple taking prominent roles -- but what
happens in its screenplay should have stayed in its screenplay -- and off the
big screen. The film, written by Dana Fox and starring Cameron Diaz and
Ashton Kutcher, is a pitiful mess -- one loud-shrieking, fast-paced, mad-cap
monstrosity episode after another, replete with shallow, brainless stereotypes
about men, women and gays, along with endless cliches and negatives about being
married. Now that's original.
Mr. Kutcher is Jack (a name providing the fodder for numerous off-color jokes),
who has recently been fired from his father's (Treat Williams) business, and Ms.
Diaz is Joy (a fun-loving executive who has just been dumped by her fiancee).
To get away from it all, Jack and Joy go off (separately) to Vegas to fetch a
bottle (or more) of alcohol. Both come crashing down and tumbling after
each other, and hey presto -- they are married -- and we see how with a little
less conversation and a little more action the two have made their Murphy bed
and lay
in it. They have their sidekick friends: Joy has Tipper (Lake Bell) and
Jack has Hater (Rob Corddry in fine bumbling form) who refers to Tipper as a
skank and a stripper. Tipper tells Hater that she wishes he were dead.
Come on now. You know that two people with this much enmity for
each other will end up having a wild bonking session before too long.
Joy and Jack are in a custody battle over $3 million that pours out of a slot
machine. The combination of Jack's timing and Joy's quarter-dollar coin
that Jack uses to bring the millions into play sets off a custody battle for the
money and a dissolution of their fly-by-night marriage (Britney Spears, where
are you?) A judge (Dennis Miller, looking wooden and robotic here as Judge
R.D. Whopper) decides that these intolerable two have to be amicably joined at
the hip as marriage partners for six months in order for the money to be awarded
to one or the other. So sets the stage (and excuse) for the knock-down,
drag-out contest that unfolds over the next hour and a half. (By the way,
"The Break-Up" (2006) does this battle of the sexes, test-of-wills contest a lot
better, and with more talented performers.)
Not that it cares to be, but "Vegas" isn't anywhere close to the brilliance of
"The War Of The Roses" (1989), a comedic cautionary tale with energy, parody and
a grim edge to it, and "Vegas" doesn't try to be anything other than a
short-attention-span film about people who hate married life -- a film which has
been done over and over again before -- and in your sleep. "What Happens
In Vegas" is lame and lazy, and while it offers a few chuckles on occasion, it
operates as one long music video full of model-types and one or two loser slobs
who just want to be wannabees. Man-of-the-moment Judd Apatow has an
arsenal of films that you know of that are better than this -- and at least they
have a little more substance and frequently sharp wit, more laughs and some
unbearably real situations than this film, which is directed by Tom Vaughan and
haphazardly edited by Matt Friedman.
During the predicable and unoriginal endurance test are cameos by Queen Latifah
(as a psychiatrist) and Dennis Farina (as Joy's boss). Her Highness
Latifah and Mr. Farina don't fare badly, but while some teens, MTV-"Punk'd"
lovers (yes, there's a gag typical of that show here as well) and Ashton and
Cameron fans will go wild for "Vegas", most others will instead wish for a film
cheekily parodying the marriage of Demi Moore and Mr. Kutcher, with the two of
them starring in it. At least that would have been more fun, even if fans
get to see Ms. Diaz and Mr. Kutcher modeling underwear so adeptly here.
"What Happens In Vegas" is rated PG-13 by the Motion Picture Association of
America for some sexual and crude content, and language, including a drug
reference. The film's duration is one hour and 39 minutes. The film
is distributed in North America by Twentieth Century Fox.
Copyright The Popcorn Reel. PopcornReel.com. 2008. All Rights
Reserved.