Written by: Josh Heald, Sean Anders, John Morris
Starring: John Cusack, Rob Corddry, Craig Robinson, Clark Dukem Crispin Glover, Lizzy Caplan
Rating: [2/5]
Receiving the opportunity rectify the mistakes of the past comes as a passing wish many have where hindsight provides the necessary clarity to change some decisions. This becomes more apparent the more we age as well as when life does not go the way we would like. It allows those “what ifs” to continually dwell in our mind. Hot Tub Time Machine provides this unique opportunity for three gentlemen and this journey to the past definitely comes with plenty of lessons to learn.
After receiving a call to check in on an old friend who had an apparent suicide attempt, Adam (John Cusack) and Nick (Craig Robinson) decide to reignite the friendship by taking the despondent Lou (Rob Corddry) to the ski lodge where they had a memorable weekend. While there they enter a hot tub that seemingly takes them back to that aforementioned weekend as they try to figure out how to get back to their timeline.
Films like Hot Tub Time Machine have no problem letting you know exactly what type of story they want to tell. Simply from the poster and the fact it’s a raunchy comedy in 2010 allows one to surmise what we can see. That includes nudity, some off-color jokes, and some mediocrity in the acting department. Unsurprisingly we received all three in this film in its effort to be comedic but for the most part just left me shaking my head for the majority of the runtime. My wife, in fact, called it from the very beginning where she stated there would be a joke about rape at some point in addition to the use of a homophobic slur. It did not take long for her prediction to come materialize. For some it comes with the times and can excuse it, but when done in such a lazy manner as employed in this movie, it feels much more cloying as a result.
The journey these characters find them at the beginning, not in a particular positive place. Adam just has his girlfriend move out, Nick finds himself in an unhappy marriage, and Lou evidently tried to kill himself. Having the opportunity to go back in time in their physical prime and relive quite the weekend presents an intriguing opportunity until they realize they need to follow in the exact same footsteps if they can get back to their present timeline. That means different things for each of them, which includes Adam needing to break up with his extremely attractive girlfriend and Lou getting beaten up. This makes for much of the hijinks the film has to offer, as these men operate once again in the 80s with the knowledge of the future.
Unfortunately, this film runs out of gas quickly where it barely knows how to make the most of this premise and relies on some fairly bottom of the barrel jokes that knocks the winds right out of the sails of the narrative as a whole. Much of this comes from Rob Coddry’s Lou, who just becomes this grating presence we have to follow throughout the film, and the more time spent with him only makes the overall experience worse. Take this and then tack on Nick’s journey where he evidently needs to become a man because he hyphenated his name when he got married as if that signifies anything regarding his masculinity. Everything in it just culminates in this fratboy humor that can certainly deliver a stray laugh here and there, but ultimately leaves nothing worth truly latching onto when viewing the whole story as a whole. It makes it a fairly empty experience overall.
In the end, Hot Tub Time Machine has everything a teenage boy would like, plenty of scenes with topless women, jokes about guys being naked in a hot tub, and attempted comedy that goes for some shock value but doesn’t really leave a mark. It makes sense for that particular demographic but if moving beyond this and in hoping of integrating the comedy into a successful narrative, it fails quite miserably in the effort. It makes for a film where individual scenes provide plenty to enjoy, but prove to be better than the sum of its parts.
Films with Josh 
