Thornhill at the Movies

This is one hilarious film.

I avoided it for a couple of weeks and now I am sorry that I did. Initially, it looks like every other comedy Hollywood makes, where the best jokes (if there are any) are all in the trailer. I'm glad to say that I was wrong. I haven't laughed this hard in a long time.

John Beckwith (Owen Wilson) and Jeremy Grey (Vince Vaughn) are two divorce mediators in Washington, D.C. One morning, Jeremy walks into John's office and announces that it is the beginning of wedding season. They have seventeen weddings to crash over the next few weeks, all types of weddings from an Irish couple, to a traditional Jewish wedding, from a Chinese couple to an Indian couple. They have elevated the practice of crashing weddings to an art form; they come up with new personas, pick up lines, and backgrounds for a variety of weddings every year, all to pick up the most beautiful women at each wedding. They become accepted, celebrated members of the wedding, giving toasts, helping to cut the cake and more. At the end of the season, John is starting to wonder if he wants more from life. Then Jeremy enters and shows him the newspaper announcement of the wedding of Treasury Secretary Cleary's (Christopher Walken) daughter. This is the Rolls Royce of weddings and the ultimate challenge for them; there will be foreign dignatires, they will have to get past the Secret Service, etc. At the wedding, John catches the attention of Claire (Rachel McAdams) and Jeremy attracts the attention of Gloria (Isla Fisher), both of the Secretary's other daughters who are bridesmaids. Both start to work their magic on them and then they get invited to the Secretary's house, down the shore, for the weekend.

From the first few minutes of the film, as John and Jeremy are mediating the divorce between Mr. & Mrs. Kroeger (Dwight Yoakam and Rebecca DeMornay), you remember that the film is `R-rated' due to some language used. Oh, yeah. The film is R-Rated! An R-Rated comedy for adults! What a novel concept. In this day and age of PG-13 horror and action films, an R-Rated comedy is a welcome treat. It is refreshing to see a comedy about adults who are horny and in sexual overdrive, rather than just the normal teenagers. If the film were cut for a PG-13 rating, we would miss a lot of the ribald humor "Crashers" currently contains.

The film begins with John and Jeremy crashing a series of weddings, insinuating themselves into the lives and activities of the people in attendance. This part of the film is amusing and fast paced. But when the boys hit the Cleary wedding, the real story kicks into gear. Jeremy attracts the eye of Gloria (Isla Fisher) and she insists they join the family for the weekend, at their house on the Delaware shore. John is immediately smitten with Claire and begins to romance her. When he finds out she already has a boyfriend, Sack (Bradley Cooper), he readily agrees to the invitation for the opportunity to woo her away.

As soon as they arrive at the Cleary house, the comedy kicks into overdrive and Vince Vaughn runs away with the show. Owen Wilson is good, but he is more or less the straight man, providing balance to the film. But Vaughn's Jeremy is a work of comedic art. Unrepentant, uncensored and unforgiving, he crashes weddings for one reason and one reason only; to have sex with as many different women as possible. When he meets Gloria and gets talked into spending time with her family, the situation spins out of control, forcing him to try to regain control. This all proves very difficult for him and creates some of the funniest scenes and dialogue I have experienced in a long time.

This is the type of film where you get the feeling you are missing things because you can't hear over the laughter. Also, there is one scene that made me laugh so hard I was crying. Its been a long time since that happened.

Wilson's John is the more centered part of the film. His relationship with Claire is the more normal relationship. Sure, it creates some laughter but it is also meant to be sweet and charming, and it is. Rachel McAdams is really beautiful and her character is charming, funny and intelligent. She seems the perfect match for Wilson, a girl who isn't so bland, who doesn't get lost in all of the craziness surrounding them.

"Wedding Crashers" isn't a perfect film. The last twenty minutes of the film drag... and drag... and drag, but this is because the first ninety were so good. It would've been great if they had found a way to maintain the momentum throughout, but I'm willing to overlook the problem.

Also, a couple of the situations don't really work. At one point, Walken says that the men should go on a quail hunt. This provides an opportunity to get into a silly outfit, to see how "silly and uptight" rich people are, but the comedic value of this scene is a bit forced.

Also, Walken is a bit sedate. He doesn't really do his `Walken-shtick', instead simply reacting to the people around him.

These few criticisms seem minor when the majority of the film is so well-done, so funny, and so memorable.