At least the original film just keeps looking better and better...

Rating: Null/10 (24 May 2013)

The first Hangover film was a surprise hit. Yes, it had glossy Hollywood production values, but it had no big name stars and in fact made stars of the three main actors.
Hangover 2 was a cash-in, deliberately politically incorrect retread of the original. This part three, well... it could have been great.
The original idea was to have Alan already committed to a psychiatric ward with the "wolfpack" (a throwaway joke in the first film that became something akin to the jedi order in the sequels) breaking him out so that he could attend his father's funeral. To do this they utilise the "demon inside" Stu by plying him with a cocktail of drugs. The Marshall vs Chow story was to have been a subplot.
This was jettisoned in favour of a plot that Jon Favreau did far better things with in his movie 'Made'.
There are some funny moments, but Bradley Cooper - on Bruce Willis-ian phoning-it-in mode - seems embarrassed to be there now, while the relatively weak acting chops of Ed Helms and Ken Jeong are laid bare by the threadbare script. This is Galifianakis's movie and one is left wondering how funnier it would have been just to focus on his character.
Lack of exposition, of any knowledge of the real story on the characters' part is what made the original such a treat. A terrific script powered it. In part three, funny sketches occasionally raising laughs, there us no such genius at script level. Acres of exposition fill the mouths of actors - John Goodman deftly using this to his advantage as the no-nonsense Marshall - and ultimately it is the audience who are lost and wrong-footed when, in a 'The Hangover' movie, it should be the characters. I mean, did we all really enjoy the nauseating "Mr Chow" so much as to have him be a breakout character?
As a movie, Hangover 3 makes a terrific trailer.