Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates

Director Jake Szymanski’s fictitious siblings Mike and Dave need more than wedding dates in this baseless and brainless raunchy comedy. For starters, it needs to wipe off its monotonous mediocrity as a lame laugher laced with empty-headed vulgarity and cheap chuckles straining for manufactured amusement. The genre regarding raunchy comedies had always had that miss-or-hit gamble about its cockeyed presentation. For the tedious and tepid Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates it is safe to say that it will not be on the Mount Rushmore of classic naughty farces in the tradition of Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Porky’s or the American Pie film franchise anytime soon.

Banally sluggish and lazily crass, Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates tries desperately to register its juvenile high-wire impishness as inspired lunacy but the profane randomness of Szymanski’s (along with screenwriters Andrew Jay Coleman and Brendan O’Brien) jiggle-and-giggle romp is about as riotous and inspired as a drippy diaper. Thankfully Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates does not entirely sink to the forgettable levels yet of say the earlier released fetid raunchfest Dirty Grandpa (although both films features principal players Zac Efron and Aubrey Plaza in the cast) but that still is not saying much for its feeble defense.

The problem with most modern youth-oriented sex farces is that ready-made mentality of delivering shock value debauchery that have no sense of coherence or irreverent purpose to support the so-called funny, bouncy rhythms of the movie is sloppily realized. Instead, filmmakers focus on promoting outrageous and recycled ribaldry without arming the unconventional story with something more serviceable and solid. Essentially Szymanski tosses the stilted zaniness against the wall hoping that anything sticks as proposed hilarity.

The Stangle Brothers in Mike (Adam Devine) and Dave (Zac Efron) is a couple of mischievous misfits that attract mayhem whenever possible. The...

Sorry Mike and Dave, it's an Alice and Tatiana's free vacay.

I should be honest that I had some good laughs, but not the overall film was impressive. For me it was a chick film, and Anna Kedrick and Aubrey Plaza are the lead actors. I really loved their parts and that's the reason I had no issue watching it, but like usual Zac Efron ruined it. I won't blame him completely, but he and Adam Devine's roles did not deliver as what the title expresses. I mean they get their wedding date, but the title should have been 'Alice and Tatiana Goes for a Free Vacay' or something like that.

It was like a 'Brideamaid' kind of film, but there are too many adult jokes. The story was sort of based on the real, and that's just a joke to begin the narration. The advertisement was real, but the remaining story was fictional. From there, how the plot developed was totally makes no sense, but it does not matter because it is a comedy. Especially the initial parts, but later on, it gets better, only the comedy wise. In some way it was not bad, and not good either to recommend to others. So it is nothing more than a decent timepass film, but some people might find it most annoying.

6/10

A great cast and amusing humour, but man does it take itself too seriously.

I think I can just about consider 'Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates' as a good film. The lead stars do respectable jobs and most of the comedy is funny, the fact that it tries to be heartfelt on too many occasions almost derails my feelings towards it though.

Zac Efron (Dave), Adam DeVine (Mike), Anna Kendrick (Alice) and Aubrey Plaza (Tatiana) all connect very well together, the chemistry in their respective cliques isn't always there but for the comical stuff they work.

Efron and Plaza would be my picks from the onscreen talent, especially Plaza who commits to the role nicely; despite an iffy accent. Elsewhere you have Sam Richardson (Eric), Lavell Crawford (Keith) and Stephen Root (Burt) appearing, they have relatively minor roles though it's cool to see them involved.

It's the attempted heartwarming story that lets this down, I guess it does leave with a positive message but none of it comes across in the film itself - I didn't connect with any of the characters on a proper level, Jake Szymanski & Co. should've just went for the 100% pure comedy. Being earnest is OK but you simply have to make it click, it doesn't here.

Thankfully, the satisfactory if sometimes hit-and-miss humour just about rescues this from soppy romcom territory.