A bad hangover

Film: Hangover 3

Director: Todd Phillips

The party-boy franchise which started off with a film, which took everyone by surprise, has ended up becoming a trilogy that died with a whimper. The third installment, Rod Phillips' Hangover 3, is a clumsy, misdirected attempt at closure, which quite frankly, wasn't even necessary. The series has been nothing but a steep downward graph of humour and emotions.

After the blast that Phil, Stu and Alan have in Vegas in the movie's first edition, the second film sort of tries to cash in on a similar premise but fails in achieving the humour in little things. Hangover 3, tries very hard to deviate from the premise and in an attempt to put the pieces back together, falters on the whole. This time around, there is no wedding, no bachelor party and above all, no hangover. But it is a case of a few loose ends from the previous edition trying to find a suitable conclusion. From being a well crafted comedy to becoming a strangely dark thriller, Hangover 3 makes you wonder why things that happen in Vegas can't stay there.

The comical punches, which were the selling point of the films earlier, are few and far between and you have to set your bar really low to laugh at certain things. The poorly written screenplay makes certain scenes really hard for you to buy. On one hand, you were sold at the concept of a drug-dealing monkey and a tiger in the bathroom of a penthouse suite, but the same franchise has now made simple stunts like jumping off a wall look downright lame.

The film, for its fans among others, will come as a massive disappointment as they had come to love the wolf-pack and their crazy adventures. But Hangover 3 fails to generate the intensity and the gut-wrenching laughter that everybody went in expecting. The film picks up from the overall disappointment of Hangover 2 and amplifies it to unimaginable heights. The baby from the first film, black Doug, and the penthouse suite in Caesar's Palace are all re-visited just as a reminder of how beautiful the first film was. But it ends there.

All in all, Hangover 3 adds to the long list of trilogies that started off with a promise and ended up like a fireworks show on a rainy day. It is sad to say, but if this is what hangover feels like, it is better to stay drunk.

Rating: 1.5 out of 5

Published in DNA (Pune) on June 1, 2013