As I mentioned on Tuesday, I have seen quite a few comments recently bemoaning the fact that Rough Night is basically a female remake of the 90s film Very Bad Things. I don’t know how, why or when I saw Very Bad Things but I was probably far too young and channel hopping late at night. I can’t say that I remember it all that fondly and didn’t see that there would be a problem with a film taking a similar premise using female actors instead.Apparently, I didn’t count on a load of random people out there who believe this to be the best film of all time. According to the fan reviews on IMDB this is best dark comedy that has ever been created. I just didn’t buy it. I mean, we all know that standards for films were lower in the 90s. Joel Schumacher’s Batman films are all the evidence you need for that. So I decided it was time to revisit the film and see if I’d forgotten the brilliance somewhere over the years. I doubted very much that I had but what is life if you aren’t willing to take risks, right?
Very Bad Things introduces us to groom-to-be Kyle Fisher (Jon Favreau) who is in the final stages of planning his wedding to fiancé Laura (Cameron Diaz). Whilst Laura is obsessively planning her dream wedding, Kyle and his four friends are eagerly awaiting their trip to Vegas for the bachelor party. Their night in Vegas quickly becomes intense as the group partake in a lethal cocktail of drugs and alcohol. After best man, Robert Boyd (Christian Slater), arranges for a stripper/prostitute to visit the guys’ hotel room, a wasted Michael Berkow (Jeremy Piven) agrees to pay her for sex. Unfortunately, the encounter leads to the hooker’s death and the men clueless on how to deal with it. Michael’s brother, Adam (Daniel Stern) wants to phone the police but, after also killing a hotel security guard, Boyd manages to convince the group that their only choice is to bury the bodies in the desert. Unable to forget what has happened in the run up to the wedding, each of the men become more and more unhinged and Boyd becomes more willing to make deadly sacrifices to cover everything up.