Saturday, February 15, 2014

MOVIE REVIEW - About Last Night

This this will come as a shock to many of you, but Kevin Hart has yet another movie out this week.  He is the hottest comedian on the planet, and this stretch has him dominating the box office as well and a few movies you can see him in right now.

About Last Night is an interesting movie. It is in essence a "classic" romantic comedy.  It does not follow the trend now of the "action" romantic comedy with a bunch of car chases, gun play, and actually more action sequences than romance, as they barely tie in a love story.  This has none of that. But should be noted, the contemporary spin put into this classic formula is that is a hard, and I mean hard Rated R.  And deserved.

This is the story of two young and very different couples in modern day Los Angeles.  Meet Bernie (Hart) and Joan (Regina Hall).  They are like oil and water. They can't get along anywhere except the bedroom.   They are in an on-again, off-again sexual relationship that seemingly is as far as it will go.  Then there's Danny (Michael Ealy) and Debbie (Joy Bryant).  They are far more compatible overall, and they have committed themselves to their relationship more that the previous two.  They are all friends, and spend much of this involved in clever and graphic discussions about each others relationships.  Will these couples find it in them to come of age, and decide that a contemporary relationship is more than just sex?

This has a lot going for it, as it is fun to see a "real" romantic comedy made again.  Our characters are essentially well defined and overall well written. Hart spends much of his time doing what he does best, improvising scene after scene bringing his stand up to his role. Many may not find him quite as funny here as other roles, because of it's design and in is a softer setting.   Hall is in the same boat as you will deduct that these two were turned loose to improv many of their mutual scenes. And much of that works. 

Ealy and Bryant have a nice chemistry, as you could imagine these two dating in real life.They do look good together.  In the long run, this movie really revolves far more around them them than the other two which was a great decision. Hall and Hart would have fatigued us out had the roles been reversed.  There are a couple of side plots that seem cumbersome and unnecessary but it's not a movie killer.

Should be noted that what this basically is, is a movie about sex.   This is loaded with often humorous dialogue that is graphic from all of our characters, and that is a theme from first to last frame. But they really come out of the box with slap-your-face early scenes that let you know this although this is "classic", this is not Sleepless In Seattle.   This may be a bit too long, and at times wanders a bit off course, this is pretty fun. 

About Last Night. Disregard the trailers you'll see.  This is a hard Rated R movie, and the previews are not very accurate on the actual content of this movie. I laughed some, and I applaud the attempt at making a movie with a formula that doesn't exist much anymore.


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