Review of I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell (2009) by Erin A — 09 Feb 2010

I'm a big Tucker Max fan, and I read his book religiously. This film is based on Max's heralded, cult classic, best-selling book I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell. The book is nothing more than a collaboration of short stories about random nights out drinking with his buddies and having sex with random women.

His stories, in essence even if they are fabricated or exaggerated as some have claimed, are pure comedic gold. His savvy charm and his sparkling wit makes every guy want to be him and every girl want to be with him.

Through his book of course, a portrait is painted of Tucker Max that renders him endearing despite his self-indulgent, chauvinistic demeanor. This majestic dickhead, so to speak, would be awfully hard to pull off on the big screen.

This daunting duty went to a no-namer Matt Czuchry, who actually pulled off a very convincing funny heartless bastard; but however, he failed to be likable in anyway possible. Another aspect of this film that drew hesitation from me would be the script itself.

The book doesn't flow like your typical story... it's just a collaboration of Tucker's random nights out on the town, there's no real story arc. So of course what we get is a very linear, predictable, over-hashed bachelor party storyline.

Tucker Max himself wrote the script, and even deemed it far better than comedic powerhouses The Hangover and Wedding Crashers. Hopefully the enormous belly flop this film took humbled our author a little.

.. but probably not. Loyal fans of the book, like myself, will recognize a lot of his stories in the plot. It's also undeniable to admit that Tucker's cruel sense of humor is actually funny. However, the film fails to capture the comedic brilliance of the book, but Tucker's followers will still be pleased.

It's a good, mindless laugh.