Neighbors

I was walking out of a church meeting the other day and I saw this well dressed hipster pacing around in our parking lot looking stressed out. I go to a predominantly black church, so when I see a nicely dressed white guy looking nervous I automatically assume that he's there to hand out a summons or he's handing out free yogurt samples. Black people don't like yogurt. He told me he was stressed because he didn't think we'd have our cars out of the way in time for his trucks to arrive and that they were filming an independent comedy on our property that night. I told him that all he had to do was let me know and that I'd have us out of his way in no time; that basically telling me basically made it a wrap. I also explained that saying something was a wrap was just a phrase black people used to use when something was a done deal. I wasn't trying to relate to him simply because he was in the movie industry; similar to when white guys say to me "what's up bro" or "how's it hanging brother?" And I took the fact that he laughed just a bit too hard at my lame joke as an indicator to where Hollywood is in regards to what's considered funny.

This is why I don't go see many big budget comedies anymore; they've basically all become glorified fart or erection jokes. And yes there is one fart joke and three erection jokes within the first 30 minutes of Neighbors.

Neighbors is about a young married couple who have just recently had a baby and moved into a quiet residential neighborhood. They are struggling with adjusting to their new life as a part of them still wants to hang out with their friends and party like they use to but the new baby (who they love btw) keeps them from doing so. So when they see that a fraternity is moving in next door to them, they are naturally concerned with the fact that they will be up all night throwing loud parties. The frat was just kicked off of campus for this very reason and they don't want to upset their new neighbors, so they make a pact with them that if they are ever too loud, just call them and let them know.

Well wouldn't you know it, one night the frat throws a party so loud that Seth Rogen and Rose Byrne are left with no other option but to call the cops on them. Once the cops arrive, the head of the fraternity Zac Effron feels like their bond has been broken and this leads to an all out prank battle between the two houses.

I have a friend from New Zealand and for some reason he thinks he's funny. It doesn't matter if no one laughs at his jokes, he just keeps throwing them at you until one hits. And that's what this movie felt like; they threw about 2000 jokes at you and only about 20% of them hit. The ones that do hit are really funny but man you have to suffer through some pretty long bits at times. There's the what seemed like a 20 minute discussion between Rogen and Bryne on how they were going to tell their neighbors to keep it down but remain cool while doing so. This of course means we had to listen to Rogen ramble for about 15 minutes while not being funny. Then there was the scene where they each had their own terrible impressions of celebrities which sounded nothing like them. I'd like to think this was on purpose but that'd be giving them too much credit.  Also I'm not sure when it became ok for white guys to openly use the N word as a joke. It's like that time a few years when it was socially acceptable to make fun of the way Japanese people talk; that was never cool to me.

I don't mean to complain too much; like I said I did laugh out loud a few times. And they did show random boobs as well, one of which included an unbelievably gross milking scene. I know what you're about to ask and the answer is yes, I still would've hit it afterwards.

In the end this was just one big joke that was stretched out a little too long. Some of the cameos worked, mainly Rafi's from The League but overall I have to rate this movie as WEAK. I'd check it out if I was bored and had nothing else to do.