Review: The Night Before is a Pleasant, if Ridiculous, Surprise

By Anastasia Kadiyala and Jackie Lee
Arts Reporter

Rating 3.5/5 Stars

When we first saw the trailer for The Night Before, we thought it looked too outrageous to be funny. After seeing it, however, we were pleasantly surprised.

The movie features three best friends: a fame-obsessed professional football player (Anthony Mackie), an expecting father (Seth Rogen), and a struggling musician (Joseph Gordon-Levitt).

The three of them have spent Christmas together for over ten years in order to console Ethan, the musician, after his parents died just a few days before Christmas in 2001. This Christmas is their last planned Christmas together, as the three of them mutually agree that they have grown out of the tradition.  

The humor in this movie was pretty ridiculous, and nobody could stop laughing, including the plethora of middle-aged adults and senior citizens in the theatre. There was nothing innovative about the plot, but the writers still managed to keep the film going, no matter how predictable the end of the movie was.

The best part of the film was, by far, Miley Cyrus’s cameo in the movie, which made the entire film worth it. That, and the sweaters that the friends wore in the movie (which are from Tipsy Elves, if you were wondering).

What made this movie worth seeing was that the trailer included the worst parts of the movie and was not a fair reflection on the movie. The jokes in the trailer were probably half, maybe even less, as funny as the other ones in the movie.  

Surprisingly, this holiday season, there have not been any big Christmas releases, so it was nice to get one in before the season is over.

Overall, this was an extremely funny movie, and definitely worth seeing if you have some free time during break.