Las Vegas: a place for partying, gambling, celebration, and of course bachelor parties. That’s the case for four friends who decide to go crazy one last time before one of them gets hitched. But things aren’t as smooth as they seem as far as friendship goes between them. It’s up to a beautiful face as well as voice to show them the real reason for being in Vegas.
Last Vegas follows four friends Billy, Paddy, Archie, and Sam (Michael Douglas, Robert De Niro, Morgan Freeman, and Kevin Kline, respectively) as they rediscover what it’s like to be young again. Billy is getting married to a woman half of his age and wants to celebrate the single life one last time in Las Vegas with the pals he grew up with. Unfortunately, it’s been a while since they’ve spoken or seen each other and some rekindling is in order. They all have some reason for wanting to celebrate the engagement unlike Paddy. The two had been rocky ever since high school when it came down to fighting over a girl. Luckily for them, Archie and Sam as well as Diana (Mary Steenburgen) open up to both of them and give them both a reason to let things go and pretend like nothing happened.
The Director, Jon Turteltaub (Cool Runnings, The Kid, The Sorcerer’s Apprentice), did an amazing job with the overall plot going in the direction he wanted to go in. To have 4 veteran actors play each of their parts so well is so remarkable. Douglas being the head honcho, De Niro as the hard-headed pissed off old man, Freeman as the wild and crazy partier/gambler, and Kline as the dim-witted likeable dope. There’s almost a close enough chemistry between the four that makes you think they’ve been close friends for years.
As good as it is seeing the four actors all in one movie, there’s nothing really else happening. Because of the style, it’s obviously going to be funny, but that’s it. At least like with The Hangover you get a mixed up mashing of events taking place all about Vegas. And because it’s PG13, the extent of which things can be said and done is a little on the light side. This is just one big sit-in-the-park-on-a-bench-and-feed-the-birds kind of film.
Your grandparents will be all over this film like it’s a fond memory of their past childhood. To enjoy this one, you’re going to need your reading glasses.
