‘Hot Tub Time Machine’
Director: Steve Pink
Starring: John Cusack, Rob Corddry, Craig Robinson, Clark Duke
Rating: 3.5 popcorns

The occasionally hilarious ‘Hot Tub Time Machine’ is the latest in a line of gross-out comedies expecting to woo a wide audience without any major star power. Riding a marketing push inspired by ‘The Hangover,’ the highest-grossing R-rated comedy of all time, the picture wears its drunken-loser charm on its sleeve. ‘Hot Tub Time Machine’ is shameless fun and represents a brand of comedy that star-driven pictures have increasingly come to lack.
   
When the reckless and irritating Lou (Rob Corddry) attempts to kill himself, his old pals Adam (John Cusack) and Nick (Craig Robinson) are unceremoniously tasked with rehabilitating him. The best medicine is naturally an excursion to the ski resort where the guys had some of their best times together as reckless youths. Adam reluctantly brings his nerdy, basement-dwelling nephew, Jacob (Clark Duke), along for the journey, much to Lou’s chagrin.
   
After a night of heavy drinking in the hotel room’s hot tub their first night at the resort, the friends wake up to find themselves not in a disheveled Las Vegas penthouse, like the cast of ‘The Hangover,’ but in a hot tub in the year 1986. After the friends regain their bearings, they debate whether to take advantage of their extraordinary situation or to keep the future intact by not disturbing past events.
   
This means Adam must again break up with his first love. Nick must gather the nerves to get back onstage and sing, and Lou has to suffer a beating at the hands of some cocky ski patrollers. As for Jacob? He just has to ensure that he’s still born, as he may or may not have been conceived during his uncle and older friends’ fateful trip to the resort 24 years back.
   
‘Hot Tub Time Machine’ is a celebration of an era long gone. In reviving a decade best known for its colorful excesses, director Steve Pink pulled out all the stops to ensure the aesthetic suited the times. The film flaunts terrific supporting performances from 1980s staples Chevy Chase (best known for ‘Caddyshack’ and ‘National Lampoon’s Vacation’), Crispin Glover (who played Marty McFly’s father in ‘Back to the Future’) and William Zabka (‘The Karate Kid’). Not to mention some inspired costume design, as the film embodies the 1980s as any period piece.
   
The premise of ‘Hot Tub Time Machine’ is so quirky that the audience holds it to a higher standard in anticipating laughs, which the film delivers. While it will not be canonized as a seminal gross-out comedy, the film provides endlessly quotable lines that linger in conversation for days after.
   
If the picture has faults, they’re due to comparisons made to similar comedies recently released. When compared with ‘The Hangover,’ the characters are bland and their escapades are rather unexciting. Though making comparisons between films is not an entirely fair criticism, it is useful in assessing the quality of a film.
       
In keeping with that principle, ‘Hot Tub Time Machine’ might not be a revelation. Were that the only major criticism of the picture, however, the filmmakers probably would not be devastated.

smlittma@syr.edu