The best thing is that you won't wake up the next day and have forgotten all about it.

Rating: 7/10 (25 June 2009)

"We all do dumb s*** when we're f***ed up" concedes a rather sombre Mike Tyson when reviewing security footage of four random drunkards stealing his tiger and urinating in his pool—and it's at this moment, around two-thirds of the way into the bizarre but infectiously humorous trip that is The Hangover that everything shifts into place. Maybe it's something to do with the fact that if Tyson can sit back and laugh at the absurdities and downright obnoxiously reckless abandon that he witnesses when brought into contact with those guys, then we can too. I seriously doubt it, but the entire expedition that is The Hangover is equally as—if not more-so—dubious than seeing a bearded guy get knocked out by the heavyweight boxer to the tune of Phil Collins' In The Air Tonight, but this in no way makes the feature any less entertaining or downright hilarious. In fact, that's exactly what makes it the romp that it is; it's silly, indulgent and somewhat charred like a barbequed steak mixed with some tough liquor, but with a fine ensemble of tangible characters and a pace that keeps things readily engaging and entertaining, The Hangover is fun, fun, fun—and the best thing is that you won't wake up the next day and have forgotten all about it.
Taking place over the course of two days and nights as three best friends attempt to put the jigsaw pieces of their wild night out in Vegas together in order to find their missing friend, The Hangover is a deliciously simple albeit compelling story. Striking right at the heart of modern western society and its tendency to do just as these guys do every now and again, the majority of Todd Phillips' feature here is steeped in infectious pathos that plays into that ever-so tried-and-true method of combining observational humour with broad, situation farce. The result is a story that flows excellently from act to act, keeps the jokes and gags steady throughout whilst developing characters and throwing them around often enough to keep the viewer laughing, intrigued and laughing some more. To be fair, there is a certain lack of substance to the overall arc of the adventure penned here by Lucas and Moore (something that is evident in a large portion of their previous works to date) that inevitably stops the feature from ever becoming more than a light-hearted buddy-comedy, but you probably won't notice thanks to lack of pauses in laughter provoked by the script or the actors.
At its heart however, despite the robustly imaginative and complex intertwining of the central characters' journey, it is the characters themselves that make the majority of this hangover such a joy to watch. While the movie ostensibly revolves around four friends, much of the screen time is given to just three of those who share a wonderful chemistry that always feels flesh, edgy and natural. Through the performances of Ed Helms, Bradley Cooper and Zach Galifianakis (who gets much of the movie's laughs as the awkward and weird bearded guy with a baby), the buddy/road-trip story that serves as the centre-piece for all their drunken antics, missing teeth, stolen babies and stun guns to revolve around really hammers home the key narrative that propels things forward and retains the script's distinctly Y-chromosome-centric nature. Sure, there's plenty of material here that the ladies of the audience will be able to latch onto, but there's no denying the overtly boyish tendencies that rule supreme here that will be sure to give male audiences with a thirst for profane, crude comedy the most satisfaction. Sharp dialogue and genuinely exciting plotting makes this one of this year's most remarkable and hilarious comedies.

A review by Jamie Robert Ward (http://www.invocus.net)