We've all had a hangover. Whether it be from ale, an overwhelming Christmas dinner or an innocent drugs binge, they're not particularly pleasant. A heavy head, dry mouth and stench of your misdemeanours is never a good way to start off a day, so you're always in a vile mood for the next few hours. They're not particularly entertaining to recount to friends, or to watch someone else have. They also have varying degrees; you can have mega bad ones. These are once in a lifetime hangovers, usually experienced after one's 18th or wedding, where Armageddon is a particularly attractive prospect as you lug your decrepit, aching body round your obliterated bachelor pad you bought to be independent, only to forget a microwave is something you should buy before a plasma telly, you ridiculous cretin. But imagine you have two of these really bad hangovers... in the space of about two years. Where you've pissed the bed, smashed your computer and sent hate emails to every friend, ex, acquaintance and potential employer you can think of. That's shit. Too soon. You still haven't recovered.
Well, I feel like that's happened to me; and I've never even had one of these mega-hangovers. My hangover calls itself a hangover, and even though it's not really, it's just as painful, just as pointless, and it feels like a worse version of stuff I've already experienced. My hangover is The Hangover. The film, The Hangover.
"Peter, that's a shit start to an article. They just share the same name. Fuck off and go and write for a newspaper you gayboy."
The problem is, they share more than a name. Hangovers aren't funny. Hangovers for me are at their worst where you can really feel them for about 90 minutes, then they fade, but the pain is still lingering. You always hear people talking about hangovers, and how they were worth it.
The Hangover isn't funny. The Hangover is terrible for 90 minutes, then stops, but its shitness lingers. Everyone talks about The Hangover 2 and says it was worth the wait and whatnot. The Hangover is having a hangover effect. As someone who uses a popular social networking website reasonably frequently, it's unavoidable. After a night out, I always check popular social networking website to untag photos and the like, and it's always there. Morons 'liking' pages dedicated to individual quotes from the film, and then the abhorrent main page for the movie, which is littered with retards saying things like (actual posts) "ITS LOVE FILM", "i wish monkeys had skype" and "great great movie... alen ur the best ....n drug dealer monkey too". It's sad, really.
What is the point to these films? It's typecasting at its very worst. I actually feel sorry for Zach Galifianiakis, he's actually really funny when he wants to be. Instead, he plays the same character in The Hangover series, Due Date and Dinner for Schmucks (which I know of). The strange, bearded weirdo that you feel you've got to love to enjoy the film. Although I can't complain too much when Tom Hanks has been doing a separate character over and over for the past 20 years. The film itself is drawn out and boring. It's a typical American comedy: unusually different protagonists in a harsh, unfamiliar environment, who are introduced to fucked up and unrealistic side characters in the process of following the story which is usually to find or take control of someone or something just to get everything back to normal. From the greats like Airplane! to the bargain bin select that is Burn Hollywood, Burn!, the formula is being replicated over and over again in today's films. Zombieland, Hot Tub Time Machine, Date Night... the list really does go on. It's easy to say that it's just one of the basic comedy recipes, but there's no proper originality any more. I'm not going to give suggestions but I will slate the whole 'lost/confused in the big (possibly foreign) city' storyline, usually Las Vegas. One of the actors, Ed Helms, had the cheek to claim it was original somewhat: "I think part of what's special about this movie is that none of the comedy comes from the characters being clever, like you see in a lot of sitcoms or movies..." That's original? Stupid people? That shows just how stretched they are for originality nowadays, they have to fake it.
As if that's not enough, I haven't even mentioned (although you've hopefully already noticed) that the Hangover 2 is another sequel. Films aren't films any more, they're franchises. Even if the first film was funny, a tired, unnecessary sequel like the Hangover's completely eradicates any sort of merit or enjoyment. Sequels can be overlooked (Jaws 2, An American Werewolf in Paris), but when they're in mediocre to shit franchises (Scary Movie to the Hangover), therefore liked by complete morons, the idiotic studio gives gigantic quantities of publicity to them, and inevitably become impossible to avoid.
The Hangover has brought upon itself every possible wrong that is prevalent in the film industry today. But it's not entirely the makers' fault. They're feeding the audience which does exist and wants these sorts of films, and to be fair, the films are hugely successful in financial terms, they'll get praise for that. Also, the originality shortage can't be helped too much; most ideas have already been used and because they're original, the imitations have run the concept dry (The Hangover itself to me is just a Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas clone). In the end, I know I'm going to have to compromise by digging through the shit to find a half decent film. Sometimes there are really funny mainstream comedies, the most recent I can think of being Forgetting Sarah Marshall, made by a fantastic Jason Segel performance. But until Hollywood eases itself away from lusting over commercial success and kills Jason Friedberg & Aaron Seltzer, nobody's going to win, and it doesn't look like any of that is happening anytime soon. For now, I'm just going to sit back, relax, and put Jaws on loop.
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