Film and TV

The Hangover’s prehistoric portrayal of women compounds stereotypes to be deeply offensive
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Film review: The Hangover (15)

By Kim Francis
June 17, 2009

Famous for his involvement in puerile funny fare such as Road Trip, director Todd Phillips’s new film won’t throw up any surprises – even if it can’t promise not to throw up something else rather more alcohol-induced. You can certainly expect something lewder and all-together cruder than anything he has put out before.

Telling the tale of a Las Vegas stag party in reverse, three of the four men involved in the pre-wedding shenanigans try to piece together the events of the night before after waking up to find their expensive Vegas villa littered with, among other things, a live hen, a baby in a cupboard and a tiger in the bathroom. And, on top of that, the groom is missing.

Friends Phil (Bradley Cooper), a hunky schoolteacher with a taste for adventure, and hen-pecked dentist Stu (Ed Helms) follow leads around Sin City with the brother-in-law-to-be Alan (Zach Galifianakis). Can they find the groom before the wedding?

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Well, of course they can, but not before they’ve uncovered some truly shocking high jinks and suffered blood, sweat and baby tears.

Phillips’s film is a lads’ mag on screen and, although it is indisputably funny if you like your humour politically incorrect, vulgar and in-your-face, if you happen to be female you should take deep offence.

Its portrayal of women is positively prehistoric. There are few females present, but those that are are two-dimensional and worse, utterly unsympathetic and impossible to identify with. The film is misogynistic and stereotypes women badly.

There’s the nagging, poisonous, controlling would-be wife who walks all over her downtrodden dentist paramour and then there’s the bride-to-be who is painted as a bridezilla.

There is also the fully-fledged wife (married to Phil) who isn’t seen until a brief moment at the end but who is representative of the proverbial ball and chain, constraining a husband who longs to be free of domestic ‘drudgery’. And then there’s the prostitute, played by Heather Graham, or woman-as-sexual-object character.

As if to compound these stereotypes, we are encouraged to identify with and, indeed, look up to the four main characters, whose antics are seen as ‘cool’. Meaning, of course, that if we don’t align ourselves with their view of women, we are ‘uncool’. A dangerous message to promote as the likely market for this movie is adolescent boys.

The film’s treatment of women aside, The Hangover is a relatively well-constructed attempt to convey a familiar story and has some very funny moments and characters, namely Alan and Oriental gangster Mr Chow (Ken Jeong).

Yes it can be hilarious but it has its humdrum moments and is also highly offensive – and not just to women. You might find much to like in this male-orientated comedy but don’t believe the five-star hype.

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