Wedding Crashers





Directed By: David Dobkin

Starring: Owen Wilson, Vince Vaughn, Christopher Walken, Rachel McAdams, Isla Fisher, Bradley Cooper, and Jane Seymour

"True love is the soul's recognition of its counterpoint in another."
-John Beckwith (Owen Wilson)

Apparently, that's the kind of nonsense one spews when trying to pick up a girl at a wedding.  At least that's what's in the wedding crashers rulebook.  I can't be mad at that, or the two hours of hilarious banter between comedians Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn that comes along with it.  With Wilson and Vaughn back on the big screen together in The Internship, now is the perfect time to revisit one of my all-time favorite comedies, Wedding Crashers.  It's time to revisit the world of Lou Epstein and Chuck Schwartz.  Or is it Seamus O'Toole and Bobby O'Shea?

It's wedding season!  What this means for longtime buddies and fellow divorce mediators John Beckwith (Wilson) and Jeremy Grey (Vaughn) is that it's time to get some fake names, some free liquor, and plenty of easy girls.  Under the guidance of the original wedding crasher Chazz Reinhold (Will Ferrell), these two have perfected the art of crashing weddings, and this is abundantly clear throughout the season.  After having lots of fun and bedding lots of women, John and Jeremy cap off the wedding season by crashing the biggest one of them all hosted by the US Secretary of the Treasury William Cleary (Christopher Walken) for his daughter.

Under the guise of distant family relatives, John and Jeremy work their magic and crash the Cleary wedding.  They soon set their eyes on the Secretary's other two daughters Claire (Rachel McAdams) and Gloria (Isla Fisher).  While Jeremy gets Gloria out on the beach and makes love to her in the sand, John can't close the deal with Claire despite solid progress.  When he learns that the Cleary family is headed to their vacation home this weekend, John sees his opportunity for overtime.  After their fun in the sun, Jeremy learns that Gloria was a virgin and is now a Stage 5 clinger.  He wants to do anything but spend a weekend with the Cleary family.  While John competes for Claire's affection with her boyfriend Sack (Bradley Cooper), Jeremy gets stuck for the weekend with Gloria, her eccentric homosexual brother Todd (Keir O'Donnell), and her crazy old-fashioned grandmother (Ellen Albertini Dow).

Wedding Crashers is the ultimate party movie.  After all, weddings are the grandest, most lavish parties of all.  With two pros like Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn at the forefront of this insanely wild movie, the party never stops.  From the moment it opened with Wilson and Vaughn mediating a divorce, I knew that Wedding Crashers simply couldn't go wrong.  Their chemistry with each other and their supporting cast members is a comedic goldmine because the laughs never stop either.  Wedding Crashers ultimately stands as one of the signature Frat Pack comedies.

It's hard to find a better comedic duo than the pairing of Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn.  They just have such natural, comical chemistry.  Wilson, the easygoing laid-back ladies’ man, and Vaughn, the crazy party animal, just work well together.  I could honestly watch their hilarious interactions on camera for hours.  For his part as John Beckwith, Owen Wilson delivers one lovable gent who knows the wedding crashers rulebook by heart and delivers his unique brand of wit and charm.  He's not quite the Tasmanian Devil he's nicknamed, but he's enjoyable every second he's on camera.  As Jeremy Grey, Vince Vaughn gets to be one wild dude as he brings sarcasm and blunt commentary in a way only he can.  After all, he's Baba Ghanoush!

The supporting cast is just as entertaining in their own ways.  For her part as Claire, Rachel McAdams isn't funny, but she has incredible romantic chemistry with Owen Wilson.  She adds just the right amount of depth to this zany comedy.  As her sister Gloria, Isla Fisher is one wild chick.  She's fast and loose, but nonetheless entertaining.  For his part as the girls' father Secretary Cleary, Christopher Walken delivers a humorous, out-of-touch political figure that's all about sailing and building the Cleary dynasty.  As Cleary's kinky wife Kathleen, Jane Seymour couldn't be anymore unlike Walken.  She may be into sailing, but a different kind.  She's interested in taking John for a ride and letting him test out some of her new assets courtesy of her plastic surgeon.  Finally, we have Bradley Cooper's Sack.  This guy is cocky, crazy, and controlling when it comes to Claire, but he's one funny Ike Turner.

As great as Wedding Crashers is, I'm left just wondering a few things.  How many people tried to crash weddings because of this movie?  How many were successful, and how many got their asses handed to them?  Like the movie, I'm sure that any answer to these questions comes with a healthy dose of hilarity.  Wedding Crashers is the quintessential summer comedy.  John and Jeremy are just living the dream.  This laugh-out-loud flick gets a sober rating.