A good early post-Bush film

Rating: 9/10 (15 June 2009)

After the self-centered yee-haw ride of 2000-2008, America wakes up with a massive hangover, looming doubt about the future, and some confusion about what has just happened. Gambling debts? Whoring? Destroying stuff you can't pay for? Getting mixed up with the wrong people? Stealing? Yup, that's what happens when the American middle class mixes the right amount of tradition and cheap oil-- err, I mean, whiskey and chemicals, as do the characters in this film.
Four guys-- a nerd, his brother (the groom), a teacher and a dentist-- go to Vegas for a bachelor party. Three wake up to find the groom missing. He has been replaced with a tiger and a chicken. Quest/hilarity ensue. The film's main theme might well be that when the social order-- here, marriage-- is followed out of mere obedience to tradition, it is sterile. The film's ending tries to give that order some kind of organic counterpart--the party, and the wedding music-- and largely succeeds.
Fun that's smart, crude and frequently oddly touching. One of the better recent comedies and a fairly new entry in its genre. Take a boy/girl to this one. And, yes, ladies, this *is* what happens at bachelor parties. At least the ones we dream about.