The Hangover Part II

THE PEOPLE WHO WROTE THE SCRIPT FOR THE HANGOVER PART II SHOULD NOT GET PAID:

It’s almost a scene by scene copy of the original movie. If you took the script of the first Hangover and replaced ‘Las Vegas’ with ‘Thailand’ and ‘baby’ with ‘monkey’, then congratulations are in order, because you’ve just written the script to the sequel.

As you may have noticed from the trailers, this movie is set in Thailand amidst Stu’s wedding. Somehow, the same Wolf Pack turns a late-night bonfire on the beach into another hazy, dangerous adventure.

Any sort of originality ends when the trio wakes up the next morning in a sketchy hotel room in Bangkok. Just like the first movie, they walk around with confused looks on their faces, take things out of their pockets, and then stumble around the city trying to piece together the previous night.

When they realize that the brother of the bride, Teddy (Mason Lee) has mysteriously disappeared, the Wolf Pack gets worried. When they find his missing finger on the floor of their hotel room, the situation becomes even more desperate. The hunt is on (again).

The one difference between this movie and the first Hangover is that it is twice as ridiculous. How do you jump a car over a canal in a crowded city without killing anybody? Why is an ambitious, young, pre-med student so nonchalant about having his finger cut off?

And why is that monkey smoking a pack of cigarettes?

Even the characters, who were so entertaining in the original, feel tired towards the end. While Alan (Zach Galifianakis) was hilarious in the first movie, I was laughing less and less at his antics as the movie wore on. We get it – he’s a weird kind of guy.

Meanwhile, the formerly charming Phil (Bradley Cooper) is in a foul mood for the duration of the movie. He spends most of his screen time shouting variants of, “I can’t believe this is happening again.”

This movie should have two separate ratings. One, for those who have seen the first movie. And another, higher score, for those who have not. Unfortunately, the former group outnumbers the latter.

The first Hangover movie surprised us: one crazy turn followed another, leading us to wonder if the group would ever find their lost wingman. In a genre that is often predictable, The Hangover set a new precedent for comedy movies. Unfortunately, Part II feels like little more than a predictable cash grab. Please don’t make a Hangover Part III.