RATING:

When the trailer for The Hangover first came out—with its promise of a bachelor party run amok (tigers! babies! Mike Tyson! oh my!)—it became an instant YouTube classic. But I wondered, could the film sustain that kind of hilarity? Could it really continue to up the ante of outrageousness?
The key to a film like this is to reveal the insanity in pieces: How did square dentist Stu (Ed Helms) lose his tooth and get married to a hooker (Heather Graham)? How did Doug the groom (Justin Bartha) get lost? Why does the hotel valet think they’re cops? Why is there a tiger in the bathroom, a baby in the closet, and a naked man in the trunk of their vintage Mercedes? And most importantly, why can’t the guys remember anything? (The in-retrospect ironic toast, the night before the mayhem? “To a night we’ll never forget.”)
The details are meted out brilliantly as the boys search for Doug and try to recreate the events of their lost evening. It would be easy to do it all in flashback, but director Todd Phillips (Old School) plays it more like a mystery: Until an obscenely (and hilariously) rococo flourish at the very end, we learn about the debauchery as the boys do, detective style.
Casting is great. Bradley Cooper excels as the super-chill alpha male of the group: We know when he loses his cool, things have really gotten out of hand. Comedian Zach Galifaniakis—with his shaggy beard, roly-poly physique, and slightly disconcerting 1,000-yard stare—adds an element of unpredictability as Doug’s socially awkward brother-in-law. And The Office star Helms enlivens his somewhat stock role—the dutiful, hen-pecked husband (he tells his wife that he and the boys are on a wine tasting trip in Napa) who is secretly itching to let loose—with memorable flare.
Some things don’t work: The film’s attitude toward women is predictably retrograde (a hooker with a heart of gold? really?) and a minor character—a mincing Chinese gangster, who I imagine the filmmakers thought would launch a thousand catch phrases—feels borderline offensive (and not particularly funny, at least to me.)
But I truly marveled at the ingeniousness of The Hangover. In a world of manufactured buzz and internet hype, it actually manages to exceed expectations. How often can you say that?

For my complete review of The Hangover, check out the July issue of Baltimore.