“Ninubus! Not I, not you, but us. The living vampiiiire,” croons little Mikey Myers. Jamie and Patrick are stunned. Here they are with years of professional dance experience under their belts and yet they can only attempt to follow Mikey sinuous dance moves that have left the arena in an exultant trance. Is this why he was such a big fan of the band? He too dreamed of fame on the big stage? They all pile down the stairs to the green room after the show, sweat coursing rivulets down their glistening chests. “My god, Mikey!” screams teen heartthrob Jamie. Tears are brimming in his bloodshot eyes and teen heartthrob Patrick is already weeping. “It was beautiful,” he mutters, “I now understand art. You are art.” Ty and Parsons are already deep into writing the next album in the corner, having been inspired by Mikey’s majestic tunes. “Gee,” Mikey says embarrassed, “I was just being me. You really think I can join?” Teen heartthrob Jamie and Patrick chuckle and shake their heads. “No, we’re done with this life. We’re thinking more of a manager role in the next iteration of the band. We have an idea for a website and we need just a little more capital to get it off the ground.” They wink at each other and Jamie and Patrick know exactly what that website might be. Ty and Parsons come over and each put an arm around Mikey’s shoulder. “We’re also thinking of a name change. What do you think about Mikey Mike and the Mikey Mikes?” Mikey blushes again, “Geeee.” Looks like Jamie and Patrick’s work here is done, but before they go teen heartthrob Jamie and Patrick ask them if they might want to stay on. At least for the next stop on the tour. That’s right! We’re watching What Happens in Vegas. It’s a classic tale of boy meets girl, boy marries girl, boy and girl are forced by the court system to try to work it all out (for love). Classic. Let’s go!
What Happens in Vegas (2008) – BMeTric: 30.7; Notability: 43
StreetCreditReport.com – BMeTric: top 24.0%; Notability: top 13.2%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 22.1%; Higher BMeT: Meet the Spartans, Disaster Movie, The Hottie & the Nottie, The Love Guru, Prom Night, One Missed Call, Superhero Movie, The Spirit, Zombie Strippers!, The Happening, College Road Trip, The Haunting of Molly Hartley, 10,000 BC, An American Carol, Meet Dave, The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, College, Space Chimps, First Sunday, Witless Protection, and 40 more; Higher Notability: The Day the Earth Stood Still, Eagle Eye, The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, New York, I Love You, Miracle at St. Anna, You Don’t Mess with the Zohan, Meet Dave, Jumper, Bedtime Stories, Drillbit Taylor, Semi-Pro, An American Carol, The Love Guru, The Happening, Superhero Movie, Seven Pounds, Made of Honor, 10,000 BC, Four Christmases, Max Payne, and 13 more; Lower RT: One Missed Call, House, Surfer, Dude, Disaster Movie, Meet the Spartans, Strange Wilderness, The Haunting of Molly Hartley, Witless Protection, College, The Accidental Husband, The Hottie & the Nottie, Babylon A.D., Prom Night, Bangkok Dangerous, 10,000 BC, Shutter, Hell Ride, Fool’s Gold, Deception, First Sunday, and 34 more; Notes: Clawing its way back to 6.0 which isn’t so bad. Not so bad at all. The Notability is pretty high I think for a comedy, probably a testament to the stacked cast.
Leonard Maltin – 2.5 stars – Super-organized Diaz, dumped by her fiance, and irresponsible Jutcher, fired by his father from the family business, both seek escape in Las Vegas – and wind up married to one another after a drunken evening. But dissolving the union becomes a challenge when a judge orders them to live together for six months. About what you’d expect, especially as the duo engage in dirty tricks, but as the film goes on it becomes more benign and entertaining – boosted by the two stars’ engaging personalities.
(Sounds about right. I think most bad reviews seem to be very focused on how trite the whole concept is and how the film really brings nothing new to the table.)
Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EsO3PfQiXy8/
(Man they should have left out the judge part of it. Without that the film kind of makes sense. With it it ends up just teetering off the edge of a farce. What kind of judge would want to deal with some annulment nonsense 6 months later? It doesn’t make sense, just split the money and annul the marriage, simple.)
Directors – Tom Vaughan – ( Known For: Starter for 10; Some Kind of Beautiful; Extraordinary Measures; So Undercover; BMT: What Happens in Vegas; Notes: He’s been doing a lot of television, like The Flight Attendant recently. He had a very brief foray into features.)
Writers – Dana Fox – ( Known For: The Lost City; Cruella; How to Be Single; Isn’t It Romantic; The Wedding Date; Future BMT: Couples Retreat; BMT: What Happens in Vegas; Notes: Apparently she was tapped to punch up Knight and Day because of this film, recommended by Diaz herself, but she didn’t receive credit.)
Actors – Cameron Diaz – ( Known For: Shrek; Shrek 2; Gangs of New York; Shrek the Third; The Mask; Minority Report; There’s Something About Mary; Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas; Being John Malkovich; Shrek Forever After; The Holiday; My Best Friend’s Wedding; Charlie’s Angels; Knight and Day; Bad Teacher; Annie; Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle; In Her Shoes; The Box; Any Given Sunday; Future BMT: Sex Tape; The Other Woman; The Counselor; Slackers; BMT: Vanilla Sky; The Sweetest Thing; What Happens in Vegas; What to Expect When You’re Expecting; Razzie Notes: Winner for Worst Actress in 2015 for Sex Tape, and The Other Woman; Nominee for Worst Actress, and Worst Screen Couple for What Happens in Vegas in 2009; Nominee for Worst Actress for Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle in 2004; Nominee for Worst Supporting Actress for Annie in 2015; and Nominee for Worst Screen Combo for Sex Tape in 2015; Notes: Y’all know Diaz. Famously broke her nose surfing and that is why she got a nose job. She stopped acting in 2014 to pursue health science ventures.)
Ashton Kutcher – ( Known For: No Strings Attached; Annie; Spread; Guess Who; Open Season; A Lot Like Love; Coming Soon; Bobby; Personal Effects; Future BMT: The Butterfly Effect; Dude, Where’s My Car?; Just Married; Reindeer Games; My Boss’s Daughter; BMT: Cheaper by the Dozen; Killers; New Year’s Eve; Valentine’s Day; What Happens in Vegas; The Guardian; Jobs; Down to You; Texas Rangers; Razzie Notes: Winner for Worst Actor in 2011 for Killers, and Valentine’s Day; Nominee for Worst Actor in 2004 for Cheaper by the Dozen, Just Married, and My Boss’s Daughter; and in 2014 for Jobs; and Nominee for Worst Screen Couple for What Happens in Vegas in 2009; Notes: He’s pretty much stopped acting interestingly. I think it is because he’s a genuinely successful venture capitalist maybe? That and he’s started a family with Mila Kunis.)
Rob Corddry – ( Known For: The Way Way Back; Hot Tub Time Machine; Old School; Pain & Gain; Blades of Glory; Warm Bodies; Semi-Pro; Seeking a Friend for the End of the World; The Layover; W.; Shimmer Lake; Office Christmas Party; Arthur and the Invisibles; Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay; Muppets Most Wanted; How to Be a Latin Lover; Hot Tub Time Machine 2; The Winning Season; Butter; In a World…; Future BMT: Sex Tape; The Heartbreak Kid; BMT: Failure to Launch; What Happens in Vegas; I Now Pronounce You Chuck & Larry; Escape from Planet Earth; Unaccompanied Minors; Notes: Still working. He was one of the more notable Daily Show correspondents back in that show’s true heyday. Won four Emmys for Children’s Hospital.)
Budget/Gross – $35,000,000 / Domestic: $80,277,646 (Worldwide: $219,375,562)
(That is solid as a rock. Which I suppose maybe explains why Kutcher and Diaz remained staples of the rom coms of that era.)
Rotten Tomatoes – 26% (34/133): What Happens in Vegas has a few laughs, but mostly settles for derivative romantic comedy conventions and receives little help from a pair of unlikable leads.
(A few laughs? So a few more than most bad comedies? So … it’s a okay comedy? A bad comedy has like … one laugh. An okay one a handful. What or we, just picking laughs off the laugh tree?)
Reviewer Highlight: We all know what happens in Vegas — and we know, without having to watch it, what happens in this movie. – Moira MacDonald, Seattle Times
Poster – What Sklogs in Vegas
(Noooooo. The dreaded white background and lack of color scheme. It’s horrible. Get it out of here… funny font, though. So appreciate that. D)
Tagline(s) – Get Lucky. (B-)
(Meh. Playing on Vegas, which you kinda have to do. Even though it’s not the point of the film, it’s still the point of the film… you know? A little clever, I guess.)
Keyword(s) – newlywed or las-vegas
Top 10: Avengers: Infinity War (2018), Shrek 2 (2004), Beetlejuice (1988), True Romance (1993), Forgetting Sarah Marshall (2008), Identity (2003), Groundhog Day (1993), The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 1 (2011), Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (2011), Disturbia (2007)
Future BMT: 80.6 The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas (2000), 69.0 Showgirls (1995), 56.1 Shutter (2008), 39.9 The Heartbreak Kid (2007), 38.6 Play It to the Bone (1999), 36.1 The Incredible Burt Wonderstone (2013), 35.0 Vegas Vacation (1997), 32.7 Indecent Proposal (1993), 31.3 Lucky You (2007), 18.6 Awake (2007)
BMT: The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 1 (2011), Yours, Mine & Ours (2005), Maximum Overdrive (1986), What Happens in Vegas (2008), Over the Top (1987), Miss Congeniality 2: Armed & Fabulous (2005), 3000 Miles to Graceland (2001), Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2 (2015)
Matches: The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 1 (2011), What Happens in Vegas (2008), The Heartbreak Kid (2007), 13 Cameras (2015), Best Man Down (2012), Broken Vows (2014), Arthur Newman (2012), Lovely Molly (2011), Carnage (1984), Honeymoon Horror (1982), Prisoners of Inertia (1989), 21 (2008), The Hangover (2009), Ocean’s Eleven (2001), Con Air (1997), Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story (2004), Showgirls (1995), Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998), Indecent Proposal (1993), Leaving Las Vegas (1995), Smokin’ Aces (2006), Mars Attacks! (1996), Vegas Vacation (1997), The Incredible Burt Wonderstone (2013), Wild Card (2015), Miss Congeniality 2: Armed & Fabulous (2005), Bugsy (1991), The Cooler (2003), Last Vegas (2013), Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2 (2015), One from the Heart (1981), The Trust (2016), Lucky You (2007), Play It to the Bone (1999), Lookin’ to Get Out (1982), Station to Station (2021), Delusion (1991), Weedjies: Halloweed Night (2019), Diamonds and Guns (2008), Three Corners of Deception (2021), Las Vegas Vietnam: The Movie (2019), The Garlock Incident (2012), Deadly Rhapsody (2001), Desert Steel (1994), Ride Me (1994), Sawgrass (2019)
(C-c-c-c-c-c-combo keyword. Look at that sweet one. I’ll leave it up to you to guess which movies are newlywed movies and which Vegas movies. Is Rock Vegas the same as Las Vegas? I’m skeptical.)
Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 16) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Rob Corddry is No. 3 billed in What Happens in Vegas and No. 3 billed in Escape from Planet Earth, which also stars Jessica Alba (No. 2 billed) who is in Mechanic: Resurrection (No. 2 billed) which also stars Jason Statham (No. 1 billed) who is in In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale (No. 1 billed) which also stars Leelee Sobieski (No. 3 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 1 billed) => (3 + 3) + (2 + 2) + (1 + 1) + (3 + 1) = 16. If we were to watch Annie, and Wicker Park we can get the HoE Number down to 14.
Notes – Diaz and Kutcher stated in a post-production interview that they were actually drunk during the wedding scene in order to make it look realistic and their erratic behavior caused the scene to be filmed multiple times. An video of the outtakes was available online, but Fox blocked it due to copyright infringement.
According to Rob Corddry, Ashton Kutcher slapped him in the face during his audition even though it was not scripted.
Joy’s party trick was performed by Cameron Diaz in another movie – Charlie’s Angel’s: Full Throttle during the recovery of the Halo rings.
The lobby of their hotel is the Planet Hollywood Resort & Casino. The view from their room places them in the northern most part of the building with a view of the Paris and Caesars Palace.
Rob Corddry’s character is a lawyer who mentions community college early on in the film. A year later, Corddry would go on to play a lawyer again in the NBC sitcom Community, set in a community college.
The nameplate of the divorce judge in the court reads “Honor the whopper” (Hon. R. D. Whopper)
In a flashback in a scene during end credits, the protagonists are shown getting married in Las Vegas. In an additional scene, we see Tipper (Lake Bell) punching Mason (Jason Sudeikis) in the groin.
Awards – Nominee for the Razzie Award for Worst Actress (Cameron Diaz, 2009)
Nominee for the Razzie Award for Worst Screen Couple (Cameron Diaz, Ashton Kutcher, 2009)
Bad Movie Twins 