I have a confession to make. I once watched This Is The End three times in a row. So clearly, I was amped when I heard that its makers were coming out with something new and even more excited when I was invited to the press junket by ThePhatStartup’s Anthony Frasier.
You know how you still feel like a kid no matter how old you turn? Neighbors, directed by Nicholas Stollar (Get Him To The Greek and Forgetting Sarah Marshall), and written by Andrew J. Cohen and Brendan O’Brien, captures that sentiment perfectly.
With new baby and a dream house in the suburbs, Mac and Kelly (Seth Rogan and Rose Byrne) are the first of their friends to “grow up.” All that is turned upside down when the a fraternity, headed up by Zac Efron and Dave Franco, moves in next door. Relations quickly sour and all out war ensues. It seems like an intergenerational battle, but there isn’t really a villain. Bad (messy, ridiculous) choices are made by both parties and you won’t be able look away.
Inspired by an episode of NPR’s This American Life, Neighbor’s comedian-laden cast also includes Dave Franco, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Andy Samberg, Lisa Kudrow, and more.
Neighbor’s may not be a refined cinematic gem, but its cast worked hard (Mintz-Plasse actually went to the hospital after a rowdy party scene) to for your laughs. Even though he spends half of the movie shirtless, Zac Efron moves away from his pretty-boy High School Musical typecast to throw down some serious comedy. And according to both the movie’s producers and stars, Rose Byrne, known for more dramatic roles (Damages and Insidious), really “held her own” against the comic genius that is Seth Rogan.
A baby puts a used condom in her mouth and a rocket leaves a butt, there really is something (well at least a laugh) for everyone in Neighbors.
