The film opens with an overdone and not especially funny Harry Potter homage we find that Will (Simon Bird/the pompous one), Simon (Joe Thomas/the wet blanket one) and Neil (Blake Harrison/the dopey one) are finding life in Britain a bit shit. Cue a transparently bullshit email from Jay (James Buckley/the horny one) wherein he claims to be working as a DJ in Sydney's hottest nightclub, living it large in a mansion and shagging half the antipodes, inspiring the others to hop on a plain down under. Naturally, it's all fibs. He's working in a toilet, living in a tent and getting his jollies from a hole in the ground, but who cares because the gang are back together, good times and epic bants are bound to ensue.
At which point we hit the film's major flaw. Having reassembled the main cast it's not immediately obvious what to have them do. The plot of the film is thinner than toilet paper. The initial impetus is Will chasing after a girl and pretending to be someone he's not in order to fit in with a group of people who transparently think he's a dork (i.e. every other storyline from the series). This just sort of peters out before the final act when he comes to the realisation that she's not all that, that he is and always will be a massive dork and that all her mates are wankers. Fine, but we've still got a fair bit of movie left. From thereon in it's up to Jay to drive the plot, who, it transpires, is also chasing a girl across the country. So they find her, they speak to her, they go home. That's it. There's also a sub plot with Simon and his lunatic girlfriend which is both instigated and resolved with pretty much zero involvement from him or any other main character. Brilliant. Neil doesn't even get his own storyline. Although he does feed a dolphin KFC. So there's that.
Two things save The Inbetweeners 2 from being a colossal waste of time. First and foremost, when it is funny, it is very, very funny. Not all the jokes hit and a lot of it depends on your tolerance of gross out humour. But beneath all the bodily fluids (all of which get at least a name check) there's a seed of relatable human emotion that stops the whole thing sliding into farts are funny territory. Very few films could make a dude widdling on another dude's face simultaneously disgusting, hilarious, touching and desperately sad. Jay could quite easily be the most tiresome character ever created, but is saved by the fact that his tireless bullshitting is clearly a by-product of his father's bullying and his own self loathing. Similarly the bickering and verbal sparring between the characters is cringey and juvenile and should get old extremely quickly, but that is exactly how emotionally stunted men children talk to each other and the writing and performances are strong enough that we can detect the four way bromance going on without ever resorting to something so crass as outright stating it. The relationship between the four lads is in fact is the film's second saving grace, lending events a fig leaf of emotional depth and preventing the audience focusing on how every supporting character is a two dimensional plot point or a walking punch line.
The Inbetweeners has long since outgrown it's original MO of a show about averagely rubbish teenagers and in doing so it has lost some of the little focus it once had. There's no real point to the film and in the main it skates by on its clever/vulgar writing and the chemistry between four actors who can now play these roles with their eyes shut. Luckily for all involved these aspects are strong enough that it's worth watching. See it, laugh your guts out, forget it immediately after. They'll probably make another in a few years. There's a faint danger that the franchise could eventually become a shite British version of those American Pie spin offs that used to clog the shelves at Blockbuster, but for now it remains one of the better comedies out there and, if everything does go to shit, we'll always have the original series.
7/10
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Updating a bit early this week as I'm off to the Split Festival tomorrow. It's only up the road, so it'd feel almost rude if I didn't show my face. I can currently hear many, many people drunkenly singing along with Ocean Colour Scene's The Day We Caught the Train. I don't even like Ocean Colour Scene, but it sounds fun. Also I finally removed my thumb from bottom and finished strip thingy.
Love and Fishes
Dave Denton
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