The Wedding Ringer (2015)
Certified: 15
Duration: 101 minutes
Directed by: Jeremy Garelick
Starring: Kevin Hart, Josh Gad, Kaley Cuoco-Sweeting, Alan Ritchson, Cloris Leachman, Mimi Rogers, Ken Howard, Affion Crockett, Jenifer Lewis, Olivia Thirlby, Jorge Garcia, Josh Peck
KRS Releasing Ltd
Josh Gad is Doug, a successful lawyer who is, however, very surprised that the stunning Gretchen Palmer (Kaley Cuoco-Sweeting) has accepted his marriage proposal.
He has no brothers or sisters, spent his childhood travelling with his parents and studying took up all his time. He has never had the time or inclination to make any friends and now needs to find eight groomsmen.
Enter Jimmy Callaghan (Kevin Hart), a successful, professional ‘best friend’ who will do everything to make the groom look like he has a strong friendship, including throwing bachelor parties and taking part in wedding preparations. This task however is more difficult as he also has to find another seven groomsmen, the fabled ‘Golden Tuxedo’.
Gretchen’s family – her sister Alison (Olivia Thirlby), who is a huge busybody; her grandma (Cloris Leachman); father Ed (Ken Howard), who is a bit unbearable; and her spaced-out mother Lois (Mimi Rogers) – complicate matters.
Jimmy has 10 days to accomplish this feat. Thus he sets out to find seven groomsmen and groom them to fit all the stories that Doug has told his fiancée. He eventually finds Endo (Aaron Takahashi), who is Asian and will need to be Doug’s friend from his childhood years and who is now a school headmaster; Otis (Corey Holcomb), a huge man who is a limo driver and wants to join the scam; Kip (Alan Ritchson), a model who stutters a lot and will need to act as a podiatrist; Reggie (Affion Crockett), who works as security guard; Lurch (Jorge Garcia), who had once been Jimmy’s employee in these scams; Bronstein (Dan Gill), who needs to pretend that he is a singer and that he loves Tom Jones; and Plunkett (Colin Kane), who has just come out of prison.
Silly, over-the-top, hilarious and starring Hart, the film seems to have all the necessary ingredients for a successful comedy. Wedding movies are churned out a dime a dozen but this feature simply somersaults over one hurdle after the other with crass and inexplicable ease.
Gad, recently seen in Thanks For Sharing, is here in excellent form and surprisingly enough he balances out Hart’s usual smooth and fast-talking on-screen performance perfectly. The situations increasingly become more over-the-top but by the end, the film starts to evolve another identity: that it is about friendship and brotherhood.
Jeremy Garelick’s film takes the same plot of 2009’s I Love You Man, but gives it a whole new revamp. And it goes all out to exploit every situation. Complete with a loony supporting cast and the delightful Cuoco-Sweeting from The Big Bang Theory, this movie is a laugh-out-loud experience.