Your childhood puzzle masquerading as 'Wedding Crashers.'

Rating: 5/10 (12 January 2006)

Wedding Crashers: **.5* (2.5)
'Wedding Crashers' stars Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson as Jeremy Gray, and John Beckwith, two middle aged single men who have made a career out of crashing weddings to pick up women. Now, here is a movie that has garnered much praise and adoration, and has been hailed as one of the most hilarious comedies in years. Naturally, after so much praise and suggestions from others to see it, I gave it a go. Perhaps The praise it received led me to expect too much, or maybe it just really wasn't very good. Afterall, I went into 'Anchorman' and 'The 40 year old Virgin' with high expectations and found myself laughing out-loud. And its not like I expected a very good movie, just a funny one. So, what happened? 'Wedding Crashers' starts off with some nice little musical montages. They were fun, but alas, not really very funny. I kept waiting and hoping for some big laughs to start during the first half hour or so, but sadly they never showed up. I began to find myself growing bored. I almost tinkered with the thought of simply walking out, but, as movies are expensive, I chose to stay and push that thought away. I thought to myself, "boy, these things really should be making me laugh. Whats going on here?" I grinned a few times, but no laughs. The jokes are intentionally corny, but rather than a corniness that you laugh at, the jokes don't' have that edge or subtle comedy that previous work from Vaughan and crew had. Maybe it's just that we've seen these jokes done better before, and they feel too recycled to be funny anymore. Now don't' get me wrong, I laughed a few times, and there are a number of funny parts. My problem is that there should have been many more funny parts; parts that were there in which comedy shines through, but its as if you are looking at it through glass in an aquarium: You see it, but cannot touch it.
As the movie progressed, I did find it funnier. The dinner scene in particular was quite funny, and a few other parts did make me laugh. The fact that Christopher Walken, who is in many respects a comedic timing master, and is hardly used is upsetting. Here is a man who, as Roger Ebert put it, could order pizza over the phone and make it a hilarious event. 'Wedding Crashers' has its moments, but ultimately falls short of its goal, whatever it was. Its clichéd heart is too clichéd to be sentimental or funny. The film ends up being that puzzle you tried to put together as a child which always had a missing piece. That missing piece keeps the picture from being whole and successful, and try as you might, you can never find where its been hidden. That childhood puzzle has been manifested as 'Wedding Crashers'- You can still see what the picture is without that piece, but its never as good as it should be with it. 5.5/10. A regrettable thumbs down.