***1/2

While most of the big summer movies involve a heavy amount of special effects or computer animation, a few times a summer a comedy sneaks up, grabs the attention of audiences and tickles their funny bones. In recent years, the big comedies seem to all have connections to Judd Apatow and his crew. Todd Phillips (‘Old School,’ ‘Road Trip’) struck first this summer with ‘The Hangover,’ an entertaining film about a bachelor party in Las Vegas gone horribly wrong.

Or right, depending on how you look at these things.

Doug (Justin Bartha) is getting married and his friends, Stu (Ed Helms) and Phil (Bradley Cooper), decide to take him to Vegas. Doug’s soon to be brother in-law, Alan (Zach Galifianakis), tags along. After drinks on the roof of Caesar’s Palace, the boys go off for their night of fun. We don’t see them until the next morning when they wake up hungover in their suite. There is a tiger in the bathroom, a baby in the closet, a chicken roaming around and no Doug. The film follows Phil, Alan and Stu as they try to remember what happened the night before and find Doug so that he can make his wedding.

This is no “Dude, Where’s My Groom,” though. The members of the bachelor party were drugged and they start to find out bits and pieces of what happened. The night involved gambling at several casinos, a quickie wedding with a stripper/escort, a trip to the hospital and a stop at Mike Tyson’s home. It all makes a wacky sort of sense and their evening does sound like the greatest bachelor party ever, although the boys are feeling much pain in the days that follow.

“The Hangover” is laugh out loud funny and Helms and Galifianakis steal the show. Helms is a hen-pecked dentist who lost one of his front teeth somewhere along the way the night before. Soon to be engaged to a demanding harpy, Stu also got married the night before to a single Mom stripper. His incredulity as the life he knew and was comfortable with starts slipping away is mined for a lot of laughs. Galifianakis’ Alan is a clueless man-child with a myriad of problems that manifest themselves in highly comical pieces of dialogue. The audience never gets his full story but what they do get is endless giggles. Cooper’s Phil almost seems like a nonviolent Moe between the two stooges, but he is an endearing character, especially as Alan begins to model himself after his new best friend.

Is it raunchy? Oh yes. It is rated R for a reason, although the “worst” parts don’t come until the end credits when the gang finds the digital camera that recorded the night’s events. But how could a movie about a bachelor party in Sin City not be risque?

There are big laughs to be had in “The Hangover” and this is one party I am sure I will enjoy watching again and again.

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