NEIGHBORS

Neighbors

Grade: C+

Starring: Seth Rogen, Rose Byrne, Zac Efron, Dave Franco and Ike Barinholtz

Premise: A well-to-do couple’s peaceful life in the suburbs is rudely disrupted when a fraternity moves into the house next door.

Rated R for constant profanity, strong, graphic sexual content (including nudity, graphic sex-related dialogue, and crude humor), drug and alcohol use, and comic violence

It’s not easy for me to review a movie like Neighbors, because I know a movie like Neighbors was not intended for me. If a shockingly-dirty, hard-R comedy about a wild, constantly-escalating prank war between a repressed, sex-minded suburban couple (comic Seth Rogen, and Rose Byrne of Bridesmaids) and the leaders of the hard-partying frat house next door (Zac Efron, Dave Franco, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, and a few others) sounds like your kind of movie, stop reading this review now, and run—don’t walk—to the theater near you, and prepare to laugh until you’re gasping for breath. Neighbors is funny—I won’t deny that. Nor will I deny that I laughed a lot or that I thought some of its many, many gags were comic genius. It’s just that, as a consistent moviegoer, I’m generally looking for something a little more, overall, than two stoners slapping each other with dildos during a wild cockfight. As much as I may laugh and roll around in my seat at a movie like that, there’s a hollow place inside where I feel a legitimate plot, genuine characters, and a point should be.

So: if you’re like me, I wouldn’t recommend Neighbors. But if my description sounds to you like the meaning of a good time, you’re gonna have a good time.

Plot

Lovers since college, Mac (Rogen) and Kelly Radner (Byrne) have their first child, live in a nice neighborhood, and have thus far steered clear of the domestic problems that affected their best friends. But they sense trouble when the vacant house next to theirs is claimed by Delta Psi, a notorious fraternity from a local college. Immediately worried the frat’s raucous, all-night parties could disturb them (particularly as it concerns the sleeping patterns of their infant, Stella), Mac and Kelly soon arrange a pleasant meet and greet. The heads of the fraternity, Teddy (Efron) and Pete (Franco), seem friendly enough. Mac and Kelly agree to call them before the police if anything gets out of hand. But on night number one, the party gets loud. Mac and Kelly go over to complain, but, offered a few drinks and impressed by the kind of fun party they themselves haven’t experienced college, they decide to let their hair down and have a good time. Unfortunately, this gives the frat boys a sense of security, the idea that they can do whatever they want, and it’ll be just fine with the neighbors. It isn’t, and Mac and Kelly, suffering through nightly ear-blasting parties from next door, soon find themselves working with Mac’s friend Jimmy (Ike Barinholtz) to either catch the frat boys doing something so bad the fraternity will be shut down, or to frame them for something. In retaliation, Teddy and Pete, who have been hoping to make the fraternity’s Hall of Fame for their antics, decide to take things to a whole new level.

What Works?

While Rogen must be an acquired taste (mostly he just seems to me to be a sloppy guy who cusses a lot), most of the cast is terrific. Byrne’s fearlessly-funny turn is particularly inspired, considering she was the one orderly member of the Bridesmaids gal pals a few years ago. The oft-shirtless Efron is a hoot, here about as far removed as possible from the squeaky-clean High School Musical franchise that gave him his start. But the scene-stealers are Dave Franco—who fully emerges from his less-entertaining older brother’s shadow with a manic but committed performance—and Ike Barinholtz, a Mark Wahlberg-lookalike who does a terrific few impressions (Wahlberg, Barack Obama, and DMX) that rank among the movie’s smaller but more brilliant bits.

Neighbors is consistently laugh-out-loud funny, with jaw-dropping, eye-popping gags and some hilarious one-liners. It reaches a pretty great crescendo with Rogen/Efron’s aforementioned comic slugfest, which involves everything from the dildos to an aptly-placed ceiling fan.

What Doesn’t Work?

As I said, Neighbors is fearlessly, proudly, shockingly-dirty, with whole scenes dedicated to the making of dildos or the unpredictable state of Byrne’s breastfeeding-stage chest. Most all of the humor is better done than in, say, Anchorman, but it’s still wildly no-holds-barred. If that sort of crude humor isn’t your thing, this is definitely not your movie. Personally, while I laughed a lot, I soon realized the humor is all Neighbors has to offer. Rogen’s fairly bland—nothing but a potty-mouthed party-animal—and he and Byrne definitely aren’t believable as spouses or parents. Neighbors fails to even consider questions like whether anyone else who lives on the street is bothered by the frat’s music-blasting parties, whether anyone notices when Mac and Jimmy step outside their office to smoke weed, or why Mac and Kelly don’t call the police when their cars are vandalized by the frat brothers. Again, Neighbors isn’t my kind of movie—you’re probably wondering why I’m asking such questions of a movie where two guys (Efron and Franco) “fight” by squeezing each other’s testicles—but the movie fails to maintain any level of real-life plausibility even while dealing with an intriguing suburban scenario. I also can’t help feeling a little peeved that a laugh-fest comedy like this features, but barely uses, proven comic talents like Christopher Mintz-Plasse (the Kick-Ass movies) and Lisa Kudrow (TV's Friends).  

Content

I hope you’ve gotten the point by now. Neighbors backs down from nothing, with the exception of showing actual male privates (it compensates with the dildos, the grabbing, and a great many references to them). There are topless women, bare butts, gratuitous pot-smoking and drinking, insinuated sexual acts, actual sexual acts, and about five F-words a minute. I doubt most teenagers would be fazed, but I still wouldn’t recommend this one for anyone under 17.

Bottom Line (I Promise):

I can’t help feeling somewhat hypocritical—I laughed my head off at different parts of Neighbors, and some of them were funny-enough gags that I want to tell people about them, but, as a critic, I can’t help but note Neighbors has nothing to recommend it beyond copious amounts of unbelievably crude humor. It’s about as R-rated as you can make a comedy. If that sounds like your thing, you’ll love it. If it doesn’t, stay away, because this is one wild party animal.

Neighbors (2014)

Directed by Nicholas Stoller

Screenplay by Andrew J. Cohen and Brendan O’Brien

Rated R

Length: 96 minutes