Hot Tub Time Machine

This is a movie which simultaneously made me cringe thinking how bad it could be and chuckle thinking how funny it could be. It could be really dumb (the unfunny kind) or fun. And it is funny. It's actually pretty darn funny. Is it as good as The Hangover (which I keep seeing as being a comparison)? No. But, The Hangover is a freak, the kind of comedy that only comes around once in a while; extraordinarily funny, good characters, fun story, and really well made. It's the kind of movie that sets the bar. Hot Tub Time Machine certainly fits the same kind of mold as The Hangover, three grown men and one who's a bit of an outsider to their group, take a trip to have a wild weekend and wackiness ensues. It's a few notches below though.

Adam (John Cusack), Nick (Craig Robinson), and Lou (Rob Corddry) are old friends. In high school they were best friends. But as they've gotten older, life has kind of pulled them apart and they're more just friends in word only, because they were friends. Lou's an alcoholic and has an accident in his garage drumming to music in his running car with the gas pedal. Naturally this raises concern among the doctor and Lou's friends. So, to keep an eye on Lou, they decide to take him back to the scene of their greatest weekend ever – the Kodiak Valley ski resort. Adam brings along his nephew, Jacob (Clark Duke) who lives in his basement and most likely rarely leaves it.

Kodiak Valley isn't quite as they remembered, it's gone downhill like an amateur down the K-12. They get their old room back, it's a dump and the hot tub is disgusting. But it magically starts bubbling again and they get in for a wild night of hot tub partying and drinking. During the course of the night, they spill a Russian energy drink on the controls and that's when things get weird – they wake up transported back to the weekend they were there, for Winterfest '86. They're themselves as they are in 2010, but the people see them as they were in 1986 (except Jacob, who wasn't born yet so appears as he is, just go with it). Jacob is a science-fiction dork so he warns them all about the danger of changing anything. So they try to remember what they did that weekend so they can do it again, even if they'd rather do it differently.

Cusack is obviously the star of the movie, but it really belongs to Corddry as Lou. He steals the show and his character really brings the emotional connection. He's an asshole, but through the events of the weekend, you see how he ended up down the path to where he is. He becomes a very sympathetic character. And he plays it so well. He makes the film what it is.

There are problems. There are jokes that are never really paid off or explained (“great white buffalo”). Characters they don't really take advantage of (Chevy Chase shows up a couple times as the hot tub repairman, says a few cryptic lines, and that's it. His character seems as though it's meant to be their time travel guide, but he's not). A couple of unfortunate crude moments (projectile vomit is not funny and scenes waiting for Crispin Glover's bell hop character to lose his arm are uncomfortable). And just a general missed opportunity to poke fun and reference Cusack's films of the 1980's (he's a producer of the film yet all there really is is a line 'We're stuck in the 1980's, I hate this decade.' Come on, you're in the 80's on a snowy mountain, Better Off Dead anyone?) and the decade in general (this should be an opportunity to look at the 80's and how things have changed rather than just a few jokes). Things like this are what keep the movie from being really good rather than just pretty funny.

I've seen the language brought quite a bit; yes, they use naughty words, lots of them. Get over it. It's Rated-R, it's for adults. Can we get over this whole 'oh my, they just said the f-word, oh no, they said it again' thing? It's been 16 years since Kevin Smith had to appeal an NC-17 rating on Clerks merely for its language. Tarantino has been giving us profanity laced films for almost 20 years. Scorsese has been “f---”-ing it up for, what, 40 years? It's nothing new. Move along and stop acting so outraged by it.

I laughed. Pretty continuously throughout. In the end, they play loose with the rules of time travel, which is part of the fun. They're aware of the problems of time travel, try to follow the rules, but sometimes it's better to change things (hey, even in Back To The Future the McFly's end up better than they were at the beginning). It won't be the most memorable movie or likely one that you want to watch again and again, but it's fun. But really, what are you expecting from a movie called Hot Tub Time Machine?

2 1/2 stars out of 5