The summer movie season has begun, and so far it’s delivered two amazing films featuring badass women and no, I wouldn’t use the designation of chick-flicks. In a movie age where we are finally realizing how much representation matters, Wonder Woman and Rought Night arrive at the perfect time though they each deliver completely different films and experiences. I couldn’t have been more thrilled to witness what some of the Broad City team brought to Rough Night, a film about a bachelorette trip gone unbelievably awry. Lucia Aniellodirects and serves as co-writer alongside Paul W. Down who also played double duty by starring as Scarlett Johansson’s atypical fiance Peter. Lucky for us, the film does not hold back and hopefully its R-rating doesn’t hinder its reach.
The star-studded cast brings together some of comedy’s best, including two of my all-time faves Kate McKinnon and Ilana Glazer who are joined by Scarlett Johansson, Zoe Kravitz, and Jillian Bell. As Jess (played by Johansson) prepares to marry Peter, her overzealous best friend Alice (played by Bell) throws her the bachelorette trip of a lifetime. They get the whole college gang together, that’s where Glazer and Kravitz come in, in hopes to rekindle their bond and create unreal instagrammable memories. This all quickly comes to a halt when Jess’ Australian friend Pippa (played by McKinnon) crashes the scene. This turns out to be the first of many debacles the bachelorette party must horribly contend with, in particular the death of a stripper and Peter’s mission to regain his never lost fiancee.
In addition to these heavy hitting ladies, a plethora of surprising cameos such as Demi Moore and Ty Burrell as the over sexed and over tanned neighbors, along with Eric fuckin Andre, Bo Burnham, Hasan Minhaj and others round out the unbelievable ensemble. While some movies tend to cheaply use cameos, Rough Night made the best of every participant. The wrap party must have been insane, I never say it, but I have major FOMO. Let me just say that the bachelor party deserves a spin-off somehow, it was a complete subversion of expectation and a hilarious role reversal that I couldn’t get over.
In recent years we have seen the attempt to replicate any and every successful comedy, with most movies falling short of any creativity or memorable laughs. To be honest, I first was worried that all the star power offered by Rough Night would result in an average film but that theory was very quickly dispelled within the first few minutes and with every event that followed. Like its previous classic party movie predecessors from the good ole 90’s and 80’s, Rough Night takes advantage of its comedic genius cast and is an unexpected balls-to-the-walls romp. The unpredictable and chaotic bachelorette party culminates in a hilarious movie going experience, and not just for women. It was a breath of fresh air to have more realistic, messy, irresponsible characters that were more relatable, as unrealistic as their circumstances were. This is further proof that with a female at the helm of the film, and at its conception as a writer, we get the representation that Jessica Chastain recently urged for at Cannes.
TRIVIA
Did you know: The film was originally entitled “Rock That Body”, before being renamed Rough Night