Four friends jump into a hot tub in 2010 and climb out in 1986.  It’s such a simple idea that it just might work.  It’s that simple, high-concept idea that started gaining this little film buzz as far back as a year ago.  It’s the same kind of buzz that surrounded the equally barefaced titled Snakes on a Plane back in 2006.  I enjoyed Snakes, which was a movie that never tried to be anything other than what it was.  Unfortunately, I seemed to be in the minority as the movie failed at the boxoffice.  Hot Tub Time Machine hopes to have better luck.

Among the four friends are Adam, an insurance agent whose wife just left him, and Nick, a failed musician who now earns a living doing work that is far less glamorous.  When their childhood friend Lou lands in the hospital following a suicide attempt, Nick and Adam decide it is time for a retreat to the ski lodge where they partied as youths.  Along for the ride is Adam’s nephew Jacob, who spends most of his waking life online.

The lodge is no longer the happening party place it used to be, but that doesn’t stop the guys from some male bonding time in the hot tub.  Somehow—it doesn’t really matter—the hot tub transfers them back to 1986 in the middle of a party weekend that served as a key turning point in their younger lives.  At first, they think they have to do things the exact same way they did the first time so as not to screw with their futures. But when they come to the realization that none of them are happy with their 2010 lives, the gloves come off.

The plot to this movie is so thin that I’m surprised I was able to get a full two paragraphs out of it.  Really, the movie is just about four guys—three, really, as Jacob is pretty much just along for the ride—who get the chance to change their lives for the better.  How they do so may not exactly be what you would call honest, but who wouldn’t use their knowledge of the future to make life a little easier for themselves?  Even Doc Brown eventually caved and bought himself a bulletproof vest.

The movie is not without its share of laughs, and it is never better than when it fully embraces its cheesy premise.  One of the best laughs comes when Craig Robinson deadpans the film’s title while looking directly into the camera.  Best known as Daryl on “The Office,” Robinson actually has most of the movie’s best lines and I was not surprised to learn that a lot of them—including that great Michael Jackson line in the trailers—were his own.

Where Hot Tub Time Machine disappoints is its failure to take advantage of the time period in which it takes place.  The ’80s were a decade that is destined to be spoofed, but other than a few jabs as the guys are discovering in which era they are, the movie fails to take advantage of that opportunity.  The movie even features its share of ’80s icons like John Cusack, Crispin Glover (aka George McFly), and Chevy Chase, but it fails to capitalize on their presence.  I’m sure they could have worked a boom box into Cusack’s hands at some point.

Instead, the movie resorts to projectile vomit, poop, and oral sex jokes that may get a couple of laughs, but lose any appeal they might have had very, very quickly.  One also has to wonder, with all that “classic” ’80s music to choose from, why does a key moment in the film feature Enrique Iglesias’ “Hero”?

This failure, combined with some poor camera work, editing, and some dreadful supporting performances—including some horribly distracting extras—make Hot Tub Time Machine just another comedy that moderately entertains, but will be forgotten sooner rather than later.

Hot Tub Time Machine is rated rated R for “strong crude and sexual content, nudity, drug use and pervasive language.”  There are some really filthy gags and language in this decidedly R-rated comedy.

Courtesy of a local publicist, Jeff attended a promotional screening of Hot Tub Time Machine.