The Hangover, for Hens.

At the beginning of the Summer movie season, there really was a lull in movies that I wanted to go and see. After seeing Transformers: Dark of the Moon, there was nothing for a couple of weeks. This usually leads me into seeing movies I have only a faint bit of interest in. Bridesmaids is such a movie.

I didn’t have high hopes for this flick. Sure it has Flight of the Conchords’ Brahbrah in it as well as Roy from the IT Crowd but judging by the trailer alone, I wasn’t really that excited about seeing it. I could never figure out if it was a chick flick or not, in the end it kind of was but it was still watchable for men.

Basically this movie is the result of an executive turning up to a meeting at Universal Pictures and saying “Hey The Hangover did really well at the Box Office so here’s my brilliant idea! Let’s do a women’s version!” And make a woman’s version they did.

This movie is pretty similar to its masculine cousin, it features some gross humour, has a few ladies going on a hen party. That’s basically it. But to be fair to it, even though the start of the movie is appallingly bad and had me regretting the decision to see it, it got better.

The movie did have some funny moments that will make you laugh. For every rubbish or awkward joke there’s a good one to make up for it, so it pretty much breaks even in that department. There are enough laughs in here to sustain you, but be prepared to sit through some awful humour.

The characters are alright but nothing special, they’re very basic just like in The Hangover. Basically each character barring the main one has just one trait that the movie plays on throughout. There’s a Christian girl who’s recently married and is new to sex. The mother who hates her life and wants sex, there’s the fat one (because that’s funny) who makes an ass of herself and farts. And then there’s the evil one who couldn’t be made out to be more antagonistic if they tried. Oh and there’s the bride, but nobody cares about her.

The main bulk of the plot centres around Annie (Brahbrah) who’s life is on a downer. Struggling to pay rent, hold down a job, no husband. You know, the important stuff. Anyway throughout the film we learn that she had a bakery business that went bust due to the recession. Might as well get that in, every other movie’s doing it. Her best friend, Lillian, is getting married to a wealthy dude who we rarely get to see and Annie worries that she’s going to lose her best friend, mainly because the evil woman, Helen, wants Lillian to be HER best friend.

You get the idea. To be honest the whole ‘bridesmaids’ thing isn’t the most interesting part of the story at all. Of course we get to see the attempt of a hen do that ends up with food-poisoning from a tacky restaurant and the bride left crapping in the street. Then there’s the Vegas trip that never gets going. And then there’s the engagement party in which Annie loses it with Helen over her stealing her ideas.

Anyway, on to the interesting stuff. Roy from the IT Crowd plays a traffic policeman who befriends Annie and she consoles in him throughout the movie. They fall out here and there and the scene in which Annie attempts to get him to acknowledge her when she needs help is probably the funniest in the entire movie. And that’s it for the interesting stuff. Do they get it together? Well I’m not telling!  

So overall I’d say Bridesmaids is a fairly average movie, it’s not tremendous, but it isn’t that bad either. Considering I had low expectations, I was hardly disappointed. However if something else was out at the same time then I probably wouldn’t have bothered to see this one. Oh and there are some really cute puppies in it too!

Final Verdict: 3 Stars. Average. The good points and bad points weigh each other out.