Seth Rogen is back as the stoner dude that everybody loves in this years must see Christmas movie ‘The Night Before’. The film follows three friends Ethan (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), Isaac (Seth Rogen) & Chris (Anthony Mackie) on their final Christmas Eve night together before commitments take them away from each other. Isaac is married and has a baby on the way, Chris has become a huge American Football player and is recognized on the street, but Ethan’s life isn’t so complete. After losing his parents on the night of Christmas Eve, his friends vowed they would spend it together. Ethan isn’t as fortunate as his friends; he has recently broken up with his girlfriend and is working a dead end job with no career in sight. Until, he finds tickets to the ultimate Christmas party for him and his friends to attend and send off their traditional Christmas Eve nights off with a bang.
Seth Rogen’s characters in his films aren’t exactly as broad as let’s say Daniel Day Lewis’ characters in his filmography. Seth Rogen likes the play the stoner dude that smokes a lot of weed but to be honest, I haven’t got tired of his characters yet, and to be fair, this has got to be one of his funniest performances yet. A highlight of the movie is definitely when his character Isaac takes Magic Mushrooms at a party and then completely freaks out. He then gets on his phone and a rant about how having a baby with his wife is a bad idea, which culminates into becoming of the funniest moments on screen for a while. Along with Seth Rogen, we have Joseph Gordon Levitt, an actor everybody can enjoy but it’s the weird but brilliant casting of Anthony Mackie, the newly made Marvel star who is loving life at the moment and brings so much energy into the movie.
‘The Night Before’ had me in fits throughout the movie and provides hilarious moments in every scene of the film. It’s helped along the way by two brilliant cameos of Michael Shannon and James Franco. These three characters are looking for the holy grail of Christmas parties in the film, but I think they may have found themselves in the holy grail of Christmas movies. ‘The Night Before’ will now become ritual for me to watch over Christmas time. Maybe not with the family, but definitely one to watch with your friends and cry with laughter over; there wasn’t a dull moment in this film and its one I encourage to watch in a huge crowd at the cinema. 4 out of 5 stars.
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