Wedding Crashers

Tomorrow, my friend Colby gets married (I'm a groomsman in his wedding), and in the spirit of the occasion, I popped Wedding Crashers into the DVD player recently. Let me tell ya, this movie was a classic right from the moment it hit the theaters—and it gave me some ideas about doing my own wedding crashing! Just picture it: me dancing with some beautiful guest at Colby's reception, then me choking up and uttering that famous phrase, "We lost a lot of good men out there . . ."

Okay, okay, now that you're done laughing (or rolling your eyes), let's get back to Wedding Crashers, where we have Frat Pack regulars Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson starring as Jeremy Grey and John Beckwith, respectively. They're childhood friends who now have their own law practice in DC, specializing in (of all things) divorce settlements. Even as the film opens, they're right in the middle of one such settlement (between Dwight Yoakam and Rebecca De Mornay, neither of whom I recognized immediately). The session has turned into a major bickering match between the newly-crowned exes, and John and Jeremy manage to calm the situation by bringing back memories of their wedding, which they're so sure was a happy time, with dancing and frolicking and crabcakes galore. This first scene serves to showcase Vince and Owen at their comedic best, right from the get-go, highlighting their chemistry and camaraderie to a T.

But shortly after this settlement meeting, John breaks the news to Jeremy that wedding season is right around the corner . . . and what follows is a 15-minute extravaganza where John and Jeremy show up at every wedding imaginable, and completely crash it—i.e., don fake names, happily mingle with all the guests, party and dance like there's no tomorrow . . . and use the perfect maneuvers to bed every beautiful unwed female guest at each wedding. (Let me tell ya, the "Shout" montage is just mouthwatering! Can we say, "Boobs galore"?)

So yeah, when John and Jeremy aren't settling divorces, they're crashing weddings and getting as much tail as they possibly can. (Enough to make a guy envious, really.)

But at the conclusion of wedding season, Jeremy discovers one wedding that he describes as "the Kentucky Derby of all weddings"—that of the daughter of U.S. Secretary Cleary, one of John's role models from college and played by none other than Christopher Walken. I think it's safe to say that, at this particular wedding, John and Jeremy get in a little over their heads (pun most certainly intended!) when Gloria (a smokin' hot Isla Fisher), Jeremy's wedding catch who proves to be a little more clingy—and far more sexually-liberated—than he expects, persuades her family to invite John and Jeremy to their estate for a weekend of sailing, football, and general partying. Jeremy's strong reservations are tossed aside by John, who's unexpectedly fallen for Claire (Rachel McAdams), the older daughter of the secretary . . . who's naturally betrothed to another guy, this one the mandatory jerk who has no business being with someone like Claire. Add in Jane Seymour as the secretary's wife—who has her eye firmly set on John—and you have the makings for either a highly successful or an outrageously disastrous weekend.

Though what John and Jeremy get is something in the middle . . . which essentially equates to a weekend of unbridled lunacy, but with the clock ticking on how fast they can go without being caught for what they are—wedding crashers who have been pulled in a little too far (and yes, being that this is a Frat Pack movie, there's raunch galore!). Yet as the weekend goes by, the lines begin to blur about who's crazier: John and Jeremy, or the entire Cleary family. Jane Seymour seriously renounces her pure Dr. Quinn persona for a more sex-hungry leading lady. Believe it or not, she even does a topless scene! (Okay, more of a side-boob scene, but still.) The Cleary grandmother steals every scene she's in with her over-the-top proclamations about the Roosevelt family, and Gloria proves to be damn near psychotic! She literally becomes Jeremy's worst nightmare—yet you can't stop laughing at all her antics! Just take the dinner scene, which had to be one of the funniest scenes in the whole movie (though if you're offended by raunchy humor, you might want to skip this).



Between Owen and Vince, I'm more of a Vince fan, and here in Wedding Crashers, he was definitely at his best. I'd say it's an even split between his acting abilities and the dialogue he delivers, because his anger and frustration are perfectly delivered at every turn. Owen Wilson makes a good turn as the smitten John, who decides to cast off his party-boy wedding crasher role in search of pure emotion with Claire—and who makes true love look so easy. Christopher Walken, though . . . well, here he just played Christopher Walken. Don't get me wrong, I think the man's a fabulous actor! But I think his talents aren't being utilized to the best of their ability, and instead he does so much supporting work nowadays that's really almost cookie-cutter in scope (i.e., it's largely all the same). That's not to say that it wasn't a treat to see him here in Wedding Crashers (because it was!), but it just bothers me to see an actor like Christopher Walken take such standardized roles.

On first viewing, though, I completely didn't see Will Ferrell's cameo coming (even though I should have). When I first saw this scene, somehow I knew that the actor emerging from the darkness was going to be big, but for some reason it just never occurred to me that it would be Will Ferrell. And yes, I do admit to not being the world's biggest Will Ferrell fan, but here in Wedding Crashers, his cameo is priceless . . . and jaw-dropping.



The only spot where Wedding Crashers started to drag was towards the end, I felt, when John falls into his funk over Claire. Plotwise, it was expected and probably necessary, but I think it could have been pared down some. But beyond that, Wedding Crashers earns no less than a 9 on my scale, with the following proclamation: if you enjoy raunchy humor at its raunchiest, watch Wedding Crashers. If you like outrageous comedy that you never in a million years thought you'd see on the big screen, watch Wedding Crashers. If you like seeing Frat Packers pull off some of their finest work, watch Wedding Crashers. Or if you just like looking at hot women, watch Wedding Crashers. All of the above reasons are good enough for me!