Plot
The night before his big medical school exam, a promising student celebrates his 21st birthday with his two best friends.
Release Year: 2013
Rating: 5.5/10 (2,079 voted)
Director:Jon Lucas
Storyline
When Straight-A college student Jeff Chang's two best friends take him out for his 21st birthday on the night before an important medical school interview, what was supposed to be a quick beer becomes a night of humiliation, over indulgence and utter debauchery.
Writers: ,
Taglines:
Blackout the date
Release Date:
Filming Locations: Santa Clarita, California, USA
Box Office Details
Budget: $13,000,000
(estimated)
Opening Weekend: $8,754,168
(USA)
(1 March 2013)
Gross: $16,875,359
(USA)(8 March 2013)
Technical Specs
Runtime:
Did You Know?
Trivia: Justin Chon is actually ten years older than his character at the time of the film's release. See more »
User Review
It's Exactly What You Expect
Rating:
"From the writers of 'The Hangover'" comes "21 and Over," another
comedy about people getting really drunk and then having a bunch of
crude and insane things happen to them. The difference here is that the
three leads are not trying to find their buddy; they're instead trying
to find their buddy's house. Oh, and the buddy whose house they're
trying to find has passed out and has to be carried from place to place
as the circumstances around them continue to get more dire.
Let's back up a bit. It's Jeff Chang's (Justin Chon) 21st birthday.
He's a pre-med student who has a big interview the next morning. His
best friends, Miller (Miles Teller) and Casey (Skylar Astin), have come
to his apartment to surprise him and take him out for drinks, as is the
American custom. Upon learning that the biggest interview of his life
is the next day, Casey does the responsible thing and says that those
plans can be postponed. Miller threatens to keep Jeff Chang up all
night if he doesn't come out. "One drink," we're told. Like that's
going to happen.
We don't even see Jeff Chang resist the party once it starts. He's
loaded by the time we've zoomed forward in time, and only gets worse
over the montage depicting the group's bar-hopping. Eventually, he's
passed out and time is running out to get him home and to bed. The
other two friends are from out of town -- they've all separated once
college started, I guess -- so they don't know their way around. They
spend nearly the rest of the film attempting to get him into bed before
7AM.
Doesn't this sound familiar? Three guys trolling around a certain
location in hopes of finding something, or someone? While doing so,
they find themselves in a bunch of "I can't believe it" situations,
while also learning things about the others that perhaps should have
been better left a secret. When Casey and Miller find a gun in Jeff
Chang's pocket, and later learn that he was arrested by the police, we
have a mystery on our hands. One whose conclusion is mishandled so
badly that I thought there must have been an alternate ending.
It feels too similar, I suppose. We've seen movies that contain
situations more shocking than this. When a guy gets run over by a
buffalo -- which we don't actually get to see, by the way, because the
camera cuts to black before impact -- that winds up being one of the
more "crazy" points of the film. Sure, a couple of other moments are
funny at the time, if only because at least one of the guys -- Casey --
doesn't seem like he deserved to be put through them, but they're kind
of bland for the genre.
There are a few running gags scattered throughout -- always calling
Jeff Chang by his full name being one of them -- but most of the humor
in "21 and Over" comes from the situations themselves. That can work
for some people. Many of you might find a lot of the film funny. It
wasn't for me. Watching stupid people act pretty stupid and have bad
things happen to them isn't the funniest thing in the world. Like I
said, there are a few good moments, but not enough of them to fill the
90-minute running time.
Moving away from the amount of laughter, which is about all that
matters in a comedy, the dialogue also leaves a lot to be desired. The
film was written and directed by "The Hangover" writers, after all, so
that should be expected. It's all profane and silly, and accomplishes
one of two things: exposition or forced character development. The
dialogue itself rarely attempts to make us laugh. That's a problem,
since there's a good deal of time spent walking from place to place.
It says a lot about our main characters that they wind up being chased
and/or hated by everyone they come into contact with. They wind up
being hunted by at least three groups of people as the film progresses,
all of whom show up seemingly at random. These groups are often
forgotten about until the script calls for them to pop up for a few
minutes. You forget, too, and it makes their reappearances seem to come
out of the blue. Sure, the film is about these three guys -- although
it's really two of them because Jeff Chang isn't awake for most of his
screen time -- but if you want to continue bringing back these
secondary characters, at least treat them with a little respect.
I'm sure that all of these actors have talent. Justin Chon turns in the
best performance in the film whenever he's awake. Skylar Astin was in
"Pitch Perfect" and fared much better there. He delivers every line
with great sincerity, but that doesn't work with this type of
character. Miles Teller was in "Project X," and plays the same type of
role here. He isn't good in either.
"21 and Over" is pretty much the exact type of movie that you expect it
to be. If you think "The Hangover" is funny, you'll probably find this
movie hilarious as well. It has issues with its characters, dialogue
and situations, but if you find it funny you probably won't notice. I
didn't like "21 and Over," but if it sounds like your type of thing,
you'll probably get some enjoyment out of it.
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