Judd Apatow has created a name for himself in Hollywood for producing a string of comedies of grown men behaving badly including The 40 Year Old Virgin, Drillbit Taylor, Funny People etc - he has been coining it.
The formula is easy: get ordinary looking folks, in ordinary situations and let them act like a fool - the raunchier, the more cringeworthy, the more vulgar and profane the humour,, the better. Now he lends this formula to chick flicks and Bridesmaid is born.
Bridesmaid’s written by Kristin Wiig and Annie Mumolo, with Kirstin playing the lead. The movie is basically the lady’s version of The Hangover minus the drugs, the strippers and Vegas. It’s fun in parts, some characters push the ante but it's generally a hit-and-miss showcasing some of the best talent from Saturday Night Live (SNL) show.
What worked for me in the movie is some of the crass humor, especially coming from Melissa McCarthy who plays one of the bridesmaids. She ain't afraid on upping the ante, and all of her jokes and situations are flat-out funny.
Kirstin Wiig’s Annie is also quite loveable and has her moments too. The film tries to use the friendship between Kirsten and her SNL buddy Maya Rudolph as the backbone of the film and the wedding preparation as the arch of the story but sometimes the wedding itself disappears into the background.
The only thing that dragged the film for me is why the writers decided to make the conflict focus on ladies being “catty” towards each other. It’s like one of the biggest stereotypes that women are not happy with other women - unlike in The Hangover when it was a fun ride watch the guys camaraderie and enjoying it.
Here there’s a subplot about the ladies vying for the brides attention which brings out the ugliness in the characters and makes some of the jokes fall flat. Why couldn’t it be ladies misbehaving without the “claws out” ?
Yet I still liked some of the themes of self actualization and friendship. I hate the idea of a forced love story but it seems you can't have a chick flick without some inane love story in the middle of it - even if the story could survive or do well without it.
Maybe Hollywood still thinks the female audience still needs those wish fulfillment moments of having a guy at the end to love, when I personally thought the idea of ladies doing a lot of unlady like stuff such as taking a dump in the street was good enough. Maybe that’s what makes chick movies "chick flick" - the “love”.
Bridesmaids delivers on the laughter, cringes and “adult jokes” in spades with one or two iffy scenes - it's not a bad night out but not a classic at the same time.