The sequel to 2009's over-hyped hit THE HANGOVER — which made $277 million domestically, the biggest R-rated comedy of all time — more than doubled its predecessor's budget (to $78 million). Despite that, though, it qualifies as an unmitigated creative disaster.
It's as if the writers, a different group from the original, and this time including director Todd Phillips — simply dropped the first film's plot into Southeast Asia and made a few cursory alterations. The exotic setting of Thailand drowns out the half-assed dialogue and incompetently constructed plotline; the film veers into melodrama and even adopts an existentially bereft tone; and you ultimately leave the theater amazed at the sheer awfulness of what you just witnessed: a hollowed-out shell of a thing resting entirely on its predecessor's laurels.
This time it's nerdy Stu (Ed Helms) who's engaged (instead of Justin Bartha's Doug), to a Thai woman (Jamie Chung), whose gorgeousness makes them a strange-looking pair. The group is once again led by Phil (Bradley Cooper) and undermined by man-child Alan (Zach Galifianakis). Phil talks Stu out of a non-alcoholic "bachelor brunch," and, before you know it, they wake up in a sleazy hotel room in Bangkok, having been unwittingly drugged the night before.
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