Movie Breakdown: Mike And Dave Need Wedding Dates

Pre-Screening Stance:

I like Zac Efron, Anna Kendrick, Adam Devine and Audrey Plaza, but the poorly titled Mike And Dave Need Wedding Dates just does not look all that funny to me.

Post-Screening Ramble:

Mike And Dave Need Wedding Dates is essentially a half-reverse Wedding Crashers.  Two brothers (a charismatic Zac Efron and a semi-funny but mostly annoying Adam Devine) are instructed that they have to bring dates to their sister’s wedding.  Presumably, the dates will squash the two’s relentless hunt for a good time and that will keep the wedding from being a disaster.  Meanwhile, two total screw-ups of the female persuasion (an adorable Anna Kendrick and an immensely irritating Audrey Plaza) are on the hunt for a way to get out of town.  This, I believe, is called a perfect storm.  Inevitably, the four all end up together and they’re off to Hawaii, where silliness and self-realization occurs.

When I say it’s a half-reverse Wedding Crashers, what I mean is that instead of two goofballs infiltrating a formal event, it’s two goofballs using two other goofballs to get in on a destination wedding.  The same kind of plot points are still hit, but there isn’t a straight-laced character that drives change in anyone (i.e. Rachel McAdams’s effect on Owen Wilson in Wedding Crashers).  The four main people are all screwed up in some way or another, and each of them uses the others’ immaturity as a way to grow up and change how they feel about themselves.  It’s kind of weird since it makes for a film where everyone bumbles about with no goal in mind until something just suddenly (and conveniently) dawns on them.  On the humor side of things, the film is mostly funny.  There’s a lot of screaming and clearly improvised lines that sometimes miss so hard it hurts, but overall I chuckled a solid amount.

To be honest, Audrey Plaza’s performance is so awful (her dirty girl/ghetto/internet/whatever accent is jarringly bad) that it makes me not want to recommend Mike And Dave Need Wedding Dates.  However, I thought the rest of it was alright, and it’s worth a matinee after a couple of shower beers in the morning.

One Last Thought:

I had three screening last week.  The first two – Swiss Army Man and The BFG – featured a lot of farting, so I assumed there would be some form of flatulence in Mike And Dave Need Wedding Dates.  Nope.  Instead I was shown that the real connection between all three films was actually Steven Spielberg.  To further clarify, SAM references Spielberg’s Jurassic Park quite a lot, The BFG is directed by Spielberg, and Mike And Dave also mentions Jurassic Park.  How weird is that?  Anyhow, that’s a glimpse into how my brain works.