The Hangover Part III

            Making a successful trilogy is very difficult.  First, you have to lay a strong foundation (A Nightmare on Elm Street, Spider-Man).  Next, you need to actually improve upon your source material (Superman 2, Aliens).  Finally, you should go out with a bang, wrapping everything up with one last, great story (Iron Man 3, The Return of the King).  Most film franchises fail to complete this formula.  The second one is a stinker, or the third one is a big, hot mess.  I think we can all agree that The Hangover Part II was a stinker compared to the first, so the question is, did they keep the third film from being a big, hot mess?

           

            On to the review!

            The answer, you'll be delighted to hear, is yes.  The Hangover Part III is not the huge, unfunny, gross-out-humor clusterfuck that the middle child was.  However, it is also not the return to brilliance that anyone may have been hoping for.  If this trilogy were siblings, The Hangover would be graduating college Magna Cum Laude, Part II would be in and out of jail before it turned 18, and Part III would be completely, totally mediocre; a straight-C student with no discernible talents or interest in extracurricular activities.

            So what's the excuse used to get the Wolfpack together for one last adventure?  That part is actually pretty clever.  Alan (Zach Galifianakis) is off his meds and causes so much trouble for his father, Sid (Jeffrey Tambor), that the old man has a stress-related heart attack and dies.  (No, this isn't a spoiler.  It's in every trailer, which is something I will get to in a moment.)  After the funeral, Alan's mother gets all of his friends together to stage an intervention, wanting him to go to a mental hospital in Arizona in order to get the help he needs. 

            Alan only agrees to go because his 'best friends' Phil (Bradley Cooper), Stu (Ed Helms) and Doug (Justin Bartha) are willing to drive him there.  Yeah!  One last road trip!

            They don't make it very far before they're brutally accosted by strangers in pig masks.  They're run off the road, chased down and tied up before criminal mastermind Marshall (John Goodman) makes them a deal: Find Mr. Chow (Ken Jeong), get him and the money that was stolen, or Doug dies.

            Yes, Mr. Chow is the thread tying these films together.  It seems that at some point in the past he robbed Marshall of $21 million in gold bars before being arrested in Bangkok.  Now he's out of jail and somewhere in the States, and Marshall thinks the Wolfpack are the only guys who have a chance of finding him due to Alan's correspondences with Chow.

            Once we establish the plot, we're led on an adventure that begins in Tijuana and ends in Las Vegas.  The thing is, while The Hangover was a wacky, action-filled comedy adventure, the final film in the trilogy honestly feels more like a poorly scripted action-adventure with a little bit of comedy.  There are no big laughs to be mined here, no funny scenes or wacky misunderstandings. 

            The plot may be the most solid one of the trilogy but it doesn't mean a thing if there's no depth to it.  Alan is as strange as ever, but too many of his actions and words fail at being funny or goofy; instead they're off-putting or even horrid.  Yes, he's supposed to be a mentally ill narcissist but holy shit you guys, tone it down.  Then there's the fact that after Alan, Mr. Chow is the deepest, most three-dimensional character.  Bradley Cooper is only there to make witty observations, and Ed Helms' role is to freak out and/or be disturbed by what he's witnessing.  That's it, really. 

            Then there's the problem with the trailers.  If you have seen any one of the trailers for TheHangover Part III then you have seen 1/3 of the damn movie.  The best lines, the best scenes, even the fucking plot twists are all in the trailers.  If you're trying to market a movie, especially one that relies on surprise and humor, especially one that is supposed to be the capstone of a well-known and marketable trilogy, do not show your own damn spoilers in the freaking trailer!

            Here's your summation: The Hangover Part III is not a great movie.  It's barely funny and it doesn't bring anything original to the table.  Yes, it avoided the pitfalls of Part II but it did not come anywhere close to the original.  It's a breezy, tolerable summer movie that you should only watch when you have friends over and beer flowing.  You'll probably enjoy it more when you're drinking.