Hot Tub Time Machine (2010)

VERDICT:
8/10 Typical Weekends for Aiden R. 

It’s Back to the Future for grown-ups. Awesome.

Hot Tub Time Machine is about four estranged friends – whose lives all pretty much blow – that decide to spend a weekend back at a ski resort where they once had a kickass weekend back 1986 in the hopes to cheer up their potentially suicidal friend. So they get there, it turns out the town has gone to hell, they say, “Screw it anyway!” and get hammered in their hot tub which, to their surprise, doubles as a time machine that sends them back to that kickass weekend back in ’86.

And that right there is why this movie rocks. It’s not breaking new ground, it’s not the smartest comedy out there and it’s not taking itself seriously, but it plays into something we’ve all fantasized about at one time or another – what it’d be like if you had an effing time machine at your disposal and got to re-live a pivotal moment in your life so that you could pull a total Marty McFly on fate’s ass.

As if the title wasn’t enough to convince me I was gonna like this.

The other great thing about this premise is that it completely avoids getting caught up in the total mindfuck that so often goes along with time travel. It’s also nice that I couldn’t find any plot holes in this regard, but at the same time, what the hell’s the point? It’s called Hot Tub Time Machine, the last thing you need to give a rat’s ass about is if it all makes sense. That kinda nitpicky shit drives me up the wall.

With that being said, it doesn’t take long to realize that this is just a great excuse to make fun of the ’80s and watch these guys try to make things right again while in a constant haze of drugs, sex, booze and Poison, and I don’t know about you, but that is fine by me. A lot of the humor is pretty irreverent and random and that might not be up everyone’s alley, but I’m of the mindset that comedy today is seriously lacking in the irreverent randomness department, so this was a pretty welcome surprise. 

And far as the cast is concerned, it’s actually kinda fifty-fifty.

John Cusack is John Cusack and it’s not that he’s a buzzkill or anything, it’s just that he’s kinda the odd man out and his storyline’s too damn dramatic for its own good. Clark Duke is also okay, but he gets overshadowed big time.

But Craig Robinson and Rob Corddry especially are hilarious. Glad to see Robinson making a name for himself ’cause he’s always been funny as hell on The Office, but I was not expecting Corddry. Never found the guy all that funny on The Daily Show, but he runs away with it here and brought this sucker up from a 7 in a big way.

Yet the strangest thing about this movie was that the funniest member of the whole damn bunch is Crispin Glover of all people. Yeah, Crispin Glover, the guy who nearly kicked David Letterman in the head with his enormous platform shoes. He’s only got this bizarre bit role as a disgruntled bellhop and he’s a total effing nut, but he was the one thing I’m still giggling to myself about after leaving the theater and he’s got the best running gag of the whole movie. 

I’m actually pretty surprised at how much I fun I had with this one. The last time I laughed so hard and consistently at a movie was Zombieland last year, and while it’s not quite up to that standard of awesomeness, Hot Tub Time Machine was still a freakin’ riot. Might be a little on the gross side at times and it drags a bit during Cusack’s scenes, but small complaints for a movie that had me cracking up straight on through to the end. I’d be more than happy to see this one again and I’d be even happier to get it on DVD with a thirty to split with friends.

Just one more reason why hot tubs are the bomb.