Film review: ‘Rough Night’

Funny but not always fun...|

“Rough Night” begins on the hallowed ground where the most crucial bonds of our lives are formed: the beer pong table. We meet four sozzled friends and, in the course of several high intensity tosses, learn some important things: Jess (Scarlett Johansson) is a natural leader and a lefty beer ponger, Alice (Jillian Bell) is her bossy but insecure friend and Blair (Zoë Kravitz) and Frankie (Ilana Glazer) are a couple comfortable wearing a costume that makes them look like a pair of giant breasts.

Alice sees this moment as the apotheosis of sisterhood and is understandably excited to get the band back together for a bachelorette weekend 10 years later. The crew that arrives in Miami (where, as we know, Gloria Estefan’s “Conga” is bumping in the air at all times) has changed: bride-to-be Jess is a Hillary-coiffed candidate for state senate, Alice is an overworked elementary school teacher, Blair is a mother going through a divorce and Frankie is a quasi-employed protest organizer.

They are joined by Jess’s friend from a semester abroad Down Under, Pippa (Kate McKinnon, affecting an uproarious Australian accent), a woman who gives herself this concise description: “Singer/songwriter is the dream, party clown is the reality.” The presence of a foreigner is a masterstroke for the film, as Pippa is able to pinpoint the insanity of Floridian mores: “Everyone in America really does have a gun.”

After an initial culture clash about the inappropriate use of the term “kiwi,” Pippa and the other women unite in their desire to follow the timeworn path of your standard bachelor(ette) party, or at least the film “Very Bad Things” – capping a drug-fueled night with the services of a stripper. The private dancer (Ryan Cooper) – one lingering regret of “Rough Night” is that none of the “Magic Mike” cast were tapped to play the bump and grinder – meets a bloody end thanks to a slip on tile flooring and a protruding point of marble.

The ladies panic, as one does after an accidental homicide – there’s screaming and an ill-advised jet ski body disposal plan. Hearing some of this on the phone alarms Jess’s devoted fiancé Peter (Paul W. Downs) who, in a neat reversal of typical roles, is having a much quieter bachelor weekend with his bros (the craziest event is a rousing game of Yahtzee). After revivifying with a glass of madeira on his fainting couch, Peter begins a fun subplot of driving through the night with an adult diaper strapped firmly in place.

In Miami, harsh words spill almost as profusely as the blood. Some commentary is helpful, like everyone telling Frankie that her Tom’s of Maine organic deodorant doesn’t work but some is hurtful, like body hair shaming suffered by Jess. On top of their other problems, the women find that they might not actually enjoy each other’s company anymore.

The film is directed by “Broad City” veteran Lucia Aniello and she layers pointed subtext under a pile of anatomical raunchiness. References to significant events in the recent history of our patriarchy are interspersed throughout – the women discuss Marissa Alexander, the Jacksonville, Florida, woman sentenced to 20 years in prison for firing a warning shot at her abusive husband, and reexamine Matt Dillon’s character in “Crash,” a cop who used his power to commit sexual assaults.

A recurring joke is that Frankie and Blair used the code word “tampon” to signal the unwanted advances of men. The shorthand grows more crucial when every guy who arrives on the scene is more menacing than the last. From the funny but not always fun “Rough Night,” it’s best to leave Pippa with the last word: “This country should be burned to the ground.”

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