Wedding Crashers

Oh, this started out so well! The first 15 minutes were a sheer comedic delight. Both Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson look like they are having the time of their lives.

Then it started to go downhill with some broad “wacky comedy” caricatures – the weird family with the unnecessarily mean and hateful preppy boyfriend, the drunk mom, the potty-mouthed little old lady grandma, etc. Then it devolved into a heartfelt message movie about the importance of friendship and love, which is where it completely lost all integrity. What a disappointment.

Good things included very good performances by the two male leads. A small, but bravura comedy performance by Jane Seymour as the drunk mom (still hot in a more mature way, some 32 years after winning my heart as a Bond girl in Live And Let Die). A goofy bubbly performance by Isla Fisher as one of the romantic interests. And Christopher Walken keeping the audience on the edge of its seats by playing the patriarch of the wacky family in a wacky comedy and never once breaking into one of his psycho rambling weirdo monologues. He plays it completely straight and it’s unsettling as hell.

Overall though, I have to give it a thumbs down for not having the courage of its convictions to stay politically incorrect and instead for morphing into a Lifetime Network chick flick. And the bit of stunt casting near the end was so needless, unfunny, and desperate that it shot whatever bit of goodwill I had left.

The disc has two versions. I watched the “Uncorked” version, which featured a few gratuitous shots of boobs near the beginning of the film. There are some curse words sprinkled throughout. The subject matter of attempting to bed women through deceit is probably best left for the older kids, although it might serve as a useful cautionary message for impressionable young females. Other than that, it’s surprisingly inoffensive, which is another point against it.