Bar Hopping

"Bar Hopping" seems to be trying to be about the stereotypical bar tender and lay "shrink" serving up pearls of wisdom followed by example vignettes played out by the cast. However, this turkey is a jumbled mess with a script full of simple-minded cliched nonsense: Hard to follow, herky-jerky flow, unsatisfying, and not worth the time. (D)

"Wow," I thought. "What the hell is this? Scott Baio in a movie made in 2000? With Tom Arnold?" So I turned it on. And there was John Henson. All in the middle of one of these 'hip' movies about obsessively selfish people that live in L.A. Hey, there's the girl from MAD TV, whose best friend (and apparently sometimes more) in the movie is one of the ugliest creatures I have ever seen, who's supposed to be John Henson's girlfriend(?) who he has asked for more space from, and both are HEARTBROKEN over it. Then we get wildly random commentary from Tom Arnold behind an unknown bar that none of the characters are "hopping." Then you get Baio, who is an extremely smooth guy named Damian who has another crazy, obsessed girlfriend after him. One of his lines in the bar is, "Pretend I'm a werewolf. Lock me out of your bed, your house, your heart, your life, because I am very, very dangerous and I might just tear you to pieces." Then he pauses and says, "How'm I doin'?" "Oh, you're good. You're real good," the girl says. OK, so that line is actually one of the better ones, but no , he's not good. Nor is any of the screenplay or acting in this movie. The closest thing is Kevin Nealon's appearance as a lonely off-duty cop who keeps thinking he sees the Pauli Girl (or Paley Girl here) on his bottle winking at him. This is one of those wired gen-X movies that tries to do so much that it doesn't succeed at any of it.

All in all I loved this movie , but not because of the acting or who was in it or anything like that. I loved this movie because I liked the idea of this movie. This is actually art imitating life. The fact that the situations that where going on and the things that they were talking about really does happen is an interesting perspective to me. While one person is at the bar thinking about one thing, another person is sitting there minding his business and seeing everything that is going on around him.There is always a conversation about nothing, a psycho waiting to blow, a relationship that is so dysfunctional that they'll be together forever no matter what. I liked the fact that they would show that while one thing is going on in this bar, at the same time, another thing is going on at the other bar.This movie reminded me of that song by elton john," the piano man." Everyone is at the bar, everyone has different things on there mind, and everyone has a distant goal and wants to be somewhere else in there lives. At the end, nothing was accomplished and nothing was solved, and just like a usual night of drinking, a lot of wasted time but at least you feel better.

A friend of mine rented this movie, and I have to admit, I thought it would be good. It has Kevin Nealon and John Henson, so it should be funny, right?

NO! This movie sucked! Let's set up the movie: It's a bunch of characters on a Saturday night at different bars. Simple enough, but the movie never finishes some of their stories! This one character goes to a bar with her boyfriend and his 9 cousins...and it never tells you what happens!

Also, what is the deal with cutting to the bartender (Tom Arnold) who is narrating? His narration was utterly pointless! It shouldn't even had been in the movie. Then sometimes, this one woman looks at the camera and narrates! She wasn't even a main character, and she only does that two times the entire movie during the few scenes she was in! I must also bring up Sally Kellerman in the tub. At that point, I wasn't paying attention, but I saw some old man, fully clothed, get into the tub with her. Who the hell knows?

The only bright spots in this entire movie were Kevin Nealon and Nicole Sullivan. He played his depressed character well. I only liked Nicole's performance because she kissed another woman. Even THAT wasn't enough to save this stinker. Do yourself a favor and don't rent it. If you do rent it, do me a favor and light yourself on fire.

Lara and Roger have just called a timeout for their romance. It's been three days. Naturally, Lara is in turmoil but insists to friends that she wants to go out to a local bar, their favorite hangout. Roger is thinking the same way. Meanwhile, another lady is stalking the man who did her wrong, a stoner is trying to avoid a dinner with his parents, an internet couple are about to meet in real life, and a walk on the wild side woman is taking a group of Middle Eastern men out for a night on the town. Will this motley crew of characters intersect? This movie is very cleverly written. It has a pungent humor that will delight some viewers but, others may find minor objections to the language and sexual content of the film. The ensemble cast is wonderful and believable in their portrayals of mixed-up love seekers. Too bad Kevin Nealon does not have a larger role! The Los Angeles setting is nice, too. For those film voyeurs who go bonkers over intelligent dialog and situations, with an indie flair, stroll down to the video store or library. You will like this one.