THE NIGHT BEFORE Review

Sitting down for a Seth Rogen comedy now means one of two things in that 1) we're either going to get a stoner comedy extravaganza with over the top comedic bits or 2) we'll still get those things, but they will be balanced out by some type of life lesson that typically holds real dramatic weight. Which Seth Rogen movie we end up getting usually depends on who he's collaborating with and lucky for us, with The Night Before, Rogen and Joseph Gordon-Levitt have reunited with their 50/50 director Jonathan Levine. 50/50 was one of my favorite films from 2011, but I haven't felt the need to re-visit it as often as I'd initially imagined. While The Night Before isn't as impactful simply by virtue of not dealing with as serious a subject as cancer it is a film I could see myself returning to more often than not, especially during the holiday season, due to the fact it's solid, raunchy fun. While the gist of the film is just that, to be a dirty, filthy, drug-fueled and foul language-filled R-rated Christmas comedy, there is clearly something more at play here and we can sense that from the opening sequence in which Tracy Morgan narrates as if reading a classic Christmas storybook. The film is framed and presented as something of a spoof on the traditional Christmas movie where everything is softly lit as if every viewer is cuddled up next to a fireplace watching and finding solace in the thought that things will never change and traditions will hold up for decades upon decades, but that is the exact theme in which The Night Before hopes to tackle. One has to wonder how long Rogen and his writing partner Evan Goldberg (who is credited as a screenwriter here along with Levine and two other writers) were going to continue to harp on the themes of boys becoming men and growing up even if it's something you don't necessarily want to accept. They have more or less been harping on these ideas for ten years now as here Rogen is playing the opposite of his Knocked Up character and the movie overall is something of a Superbad eight years down the road. The catch is, it works, and it puts a kind of kibosh on the theme as each character either comes to realize these truths or is able to get over the hump of revealing them to the ones they care about most.

Red Band Trailer for THE NIGHT BEFORE

Joseph Gordon-Levitt is putting in work in some high caliber projects this fall by portraying real-life figures Edward Snowden and Philippe Petit in movies for Robert Zemeckis and Oliver Stone. Seth Rogen is also portraying a real-life figure as Steve Wozniak for director Danny Boyle while Anthony Mackie will play a supporting role alongside Sandy Bullock in director David Gordon Green's Our Brand is Crisis that just received an Awards-friendly release date yesterday. Needless to say, these three young actors from varying backgrounds have a lot going on later this year, but that hasn't stopped them from getting together to make a comedy about getting together and continuing a tradition. In The Night Before (formerly titled X-Mas) Ethan (Gordon-Levitt), Isaac (Rogen) and Chris (Mackie) come together for one last debauchery-filled Christmas Eve reunion before officially becoming too old for the tradition. Chris is apparently some sort of sports star which makes it difficult for the three to carry out their tradition without some sort of interruption and Isaac is getting ready to become a father which will mean holidays equal family only from this point on. There is the glaring omission of any reasoning behind Ethan's need to move on, but I'm sure that is where co-writer/director Jonathan Levine (50/50, Warm Bodies) will find his opportunity to include the more dramatic and emotional side of things. Taken on its own though, this red-band trailer delivers some serious laughs and looks to be a nice deviation from the family-friendly material that will crowd the cineplexes during the "most winderful time of the year." The Night Before also stars Mindy Kailing, Lizzy Caplan, Jillian Bell, Kanye West, Lorraine Toussaint, Heléne Yorke, Michael Shannon and opens on November 25th.