Stars: Cameron Diaz, Ashton Kutcher, Rob Corddry
Directed by: Tom Vaughn
Reviewed by: Adam Mast, Zboneman.com
Grade: C+
What Happens in Vegas is certainly of the lame sitcom variety. It stars two incredibly attractive individuals in the form of Cameron Diaz and Ashton Kutcher, but it is the supporting cast that really keeps the film afloat.
In What Happens in Vegas - which, ironically, only uses Sin City as a backdrop for about fifteen minutes of it's running time – stars Ashton Kutcher as Jack, a New Yorker who opts to spend a raucous weekend in Vegas with his best friend after losing his job. His Vegas adventure leads him to Cameron Diaz's Joy, a fiercely independent business woman in town to let loose after her successful fiancee (played by SNL's Jason Sudeikis) dumps her. At first, Jack and Joy don't like each other much, but after a night of heavy partying, they wake up to a sorry set of circumstances. While in a drunken stooper, these two nitwits get married. From there, things get even more absurd.
What Happens in Vegas has moments of charm, but these moments are grossly undercut by the film's lame battle of the sexes plot thread. Watch as these two undeniably attractive stars spend the majority of the film trying to outwit each other. Why are they constantly at each other's throats? Because a large sum of money is at stake of course.
Cameron Diaz can be an absolute charmer and for what it's worth, once in a great while Kutcher exudes a certain amount of charisma himself. The problem here is, that when these two go after each other, there's nothing funny about it. The battle of the sexes gags, which range from the removal of a toilet seat, to a stupid sequence in which Diaz invites a bunch of party girls to the house in hopes that Kutcher will cheat on her, are painfully unfunny. Not until the final act of the movie are Diaz and Kutcher able to show their soft centers, and by that point both characters are more annoying than anything else.
Happily, we do finally get to see a little bit of heart and chemistry between the two leads. And even better, Kutcher and Diaz are surrounded by a very funny supporting cast. Rob Cordry and Lake Bell are an absolute riot as Jack and Joy's best friends. Dennis Miller has a few humorous moments as a judge out to better the lives of the misguided leads. Treat Williams shows up in a tiny but funny role as Jack's working class father. And then there's the wonderful character actor Dennis Farina as Joy's big mouth boss Banger. Everytime he's on screen, he makes the movie better.
What Happens in Vegas is a sub par comedy filled with really dumb gags, but as romantic comedies go, you could do much worse (Fool's Gold anyone?)
