Can you think of anything more hilarious than three adult men waking up in a trashed Las Vegas hotel room with a tiger, a baby and no memory of the previous night’s drunken revelry? Unfortunately, director Todd Phillips and writers Jon Lucas and Scott Moore could not. Although The Hangover has a few laugh-inducing scenes, we do not really care about the story or the characters. But the biggest problem with this film is that it is just not that funny.

To celebrate Doug’s (Justin Bartha) impending marriage, friends Phil (Bradley Cooper) and Stu (The Office’s Ed Helms), along with Doug’s future brother-in-law Alan (Zach Galifinanakis) head to Las Vegas for an overnight bachelor party. Anyone who has ever visited sin city can tell you that it is filled with packs of males laughing, drinking and flexing their testosterone. These four guys are no exception. After toasting each other on the roof, the group parties all night. When they wake, Doug is nowhere to be found and the other three have no idea what happened to him or to them. They have a few clues, such as a hospital bracelet, a bed on the roof and the fact that one of them is missing a tooth. For the rest of The Hangover, Phil, Stu and Alan run around Las Vegas trying to find the missing groom and their missing memories. Their search brings them to a stripper, a hospital, a police station, an Asian crime lord and to Mike Tyson.

Batha, Cooper, Helms and Galifinanakis have no particular chemistry and do not look like guys who would be friends. While I am happy to spend hours staring at hunky Bradley Cooper, so appealing in He’s Just Not That In To You, neither Cooper, Batha or Helms give memorable comedic performances. However, stand- up comic Galifinanakis does. His character Alan is a little bit weird, but not much weirder than someone you might know. His toast on the roof about a wolf pack and blood brothers is hilarious, in large part because Galifinanakis is so sincere. Alan’s social awkwardness and desire to have friends make him the one appealing character in this film.

The remainder of the too-few funny moments in The Hangover belongs to a few funny actors in small parts. Former Daily Show correspondent Rob Riggle is very funny as the sadistic cop who teaches the three stars a lesson by using them in a stun gun demonstration for an elementary school class. The marvelous Jeffrey Tambor is wasted in the tiny role of the groom’s indulgent future father-in-law, who says knowingly to Doug, “Vegas.” It is also fun to see Mike Tyson playing himself. The funniest supporting performance in the film is the one given by Ken Jeong. His Mr. Chow is hilarious and scary, as he both threatens and mocks Phil, Stu and Alan. He alternates between being effeminate and menacing, and both are funny. But the funny moments are too rare in this film.

Ok, I am not the demographic that the film is aimed toward, but The Hangover is not even close to being as funny as other similar films about immature guys. I Love You, Man and Forgetting Sarah Marshall are both funnier than The Hangover, and those films are not as funny as Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle or The Forty Year Old Virgin. The best part of the film is the credits, when we get to see still photographs of what happened during the group black out. Those photographs would have made a better film than The Hangover. In this case, what happened in Vegas should have stayed in Vegas.

The Hangover. Directed by Todd Phillips. Bradley Cooper (Phil Wennick), Ed Helms (Stu Price), Zach Galifinanakis (Alan Garner), Justin Bartha (Doug Billings), Rob Riggle (Officer Franklin), Jeffrey Tambor (Sid Garner), Mike Tyson (Himself) and Ken Jeung (Mr. Chow). Warner Bros Pictures, 2009.

Gail sees a movie appears every Wednesday.

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