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Wednesday, July 20, 2005 | ||
What do you think of this story? Bad Links? | Wedding Crashers This is Hardcore?The buzz around the new Owen Wilson - Vince Vaughn comedy was that it was a film that harkened back to the R-rated comedies of the 1980s. It was supposed to be full of hard bodies and suggestive themes. Wedding Crashers may pay homage to those elements but it is no raunchy film. In fact, if you throw out a dozen or so uses of a certain curse word and forget about a montage that has seven second-long instances of partial nudity, this film may as well be Sleepless in Seattle. O.K., maybe thats going a little too far, but you get my point. This aint Porkys. Wedding Crashers follows divorce mediators John and Jeremy (Wilson and Vaughn) who celebrate for a three week period every year by crashing weddings. This entitles them to free food, free booze and single women who are looking for love after witnessing the ultimate romantic event. John and Jeremy are very successful at crashing weddings and they are always the hit of the party. The montage of them crashing numerous weddings is very funny as it showcases the charms that both characters have and this movie relies heavily on those charms. The two decide to crash one final wedding of the season, involving the daughter of a high ranking government official, Secretary Cleary, played by Christopher Walken. The two pick out their conquests, both end up being Cleary's other daughters and, of course, John falls in love. Wedding Crashers is almost a paint by numbers romantic comedy from that point on with the exception of a few brief scenes or snippets of dialogue that may make some people blush. There is a lot to like in Wedding Crashers, particularly Vaughns performance. Vaughns Jeremy is a fast-talking lothario, much like his characters in Swingers and Old School and when the film slows down for Wilsons romance with Claire, played by the stunning Rachel McAdams, Vaughn boosts the energy levels in the scenes he is in, bringing back the funny. It also helps that he is teamed up with the zany Isla Fisher, who plays Gloria Cleary with a wacky madness that the film could have used more of. Wilsons main job in the film is to fall for Claire but he isnt given much else to do, which is too bad because he can pull off so much more. McAdams is turning into quite the leading lady and her performance as the perfect girl appears effortless. Speaking of effortless, while watching recent films that featured Walken I found myself wishing that he would tone down the crazy but he could have certainly turned it up a bit here. Why have him if he is just going to be a straight man? There is more that I did not like in Wedding Crashers. Jane Seymours Kathleen Cleary, the wife of Walkens character, has very little to do and what she does is drink heavily and come on to Wilson. Not funny. There is also the gay brother character who seems to only be there to provide one uncomfortable scene. Not funny and not necessary and yet every big comedy seems to have to have some joke about a gay person who just cant help but come on to an uninterested straight person. Has that happened to you? It hasnt happened to me. In fact, I only think that it happens in films like this and episodes of The Jenny Jones Show. Perhaps the unfunniest part of this comedy though is a terrible cameo from Will Ferrell. Ferrell can be terrific but his character in this film falls flat and he takes that part of the movie with him. Seeing Wedding Crashers is like going to the wedding of a second cousin or a friend of your spouses. You have a good time for a little while but eventually you run out of people to talk to, you dont want to dance anymore, youre starting to feel a little hung-over and you want to go home.
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