Four girlfriends take a trip to New Orleans for an annual festival and, along the way, rediscover their wild sides and strengthen the bonds of sisterhood.
Girls Trip might be formulaic, but it surprisingly has several laugh out loud moments. The surprise comedy of 2017, I'm pretty sure no one expected it to be this enjoyable. Fortunately it is, and that's coming from someone who dislikes American comedies. A group of old friends get together for a few nights out in New Orleans, partying their lives away. Unfortunately their personal and work aspects interrupt them from having the smoothest of gatherings. It's a classic formula. Old friends, crazy parties with drunken antics, arguments boil over where they fall out and then shortly after forgive each other to become better people. The reason why this familiarity is consistently shadowing modern comedies, is because it works. Alcohol, drugs, absinthe, sassy arguments, hallucinogenic mind trips, zip wiring across buildings whilst peeing to the crowds below, dance offs in underground clubs, celebrity cameos and a mountain of crude sexual innuendos including a banana and a grapefruit. We've seen this all before and yet I still succumb to the ridiculous onscreen antics. What keeps these types of films fresh is the chemistry between the lead characters. We've got some "nasty" girls who are "nasty" funny and have some "nasty" sense of humour. Ohhh they "nasty"! Seriously though, all four lead actresses owned this film. Regina Hall finally has some much needed screen time in her career without me exclaiming "Cindy...the TV is leaking!" (Props if you know the quote). They just all gelled well together, I could tell they were having fun and consequently made me enjoy the film even more. Some jokes obviously fell flat, however a variety of hilarious scenes made me crease. Particularly the after effects of consuming a large quantity of absinthe, damn that was funny. Direction was solid, soundtrack had some great club tracks and addressing colloquialisms in the script felt natural. So yeah, surprise surprise I actually enjoyed a new comedy. It might not be anything new or innovative, but it does the job and does so with confidence.
