Metacritic reviews

It may be overstuffed the point of bursting, but there's much to like here.

Always energetic like the wild whoop of a bachelor party, the lights burn brightest when The Night Before indulges in big goofs and kooky tangents.

It offers more than enough laughs to justify taking time out from TV marathons of A Christmas Story, and maybe enough, at least for younger audiences, to become a pinch-hitter each year when established classics like Elf grow too familiar.

Rogen’s zonked-to-insanity performance is the lifeblood of The Night Before, giving it the sort of joyous, madcap energy that comes from letting loose with one’s closest comrades, even to the point of potential oblivion.

If the spirit of the season is making you sick to your stomach, The Night Before, scruffy and uneven as it is, might be the perfect purge.

Surprisingly, for a movie this ephemeral, the closing sequences, which consist of flashbacks and confrontations, are actually quite touching.

Jonathan Levine’s night of debauchery and hugs hits a sweet spot of inoffensive offensiveness.

It’s as if the makers of The Night Before have it in them to make a touching and funny movie but instead throw that chance away by not taking what they’re doing seriously enough.

A so-so stoner film where the premise is almost always better than the execution.

At first the laughs are Hangover III–spare and the picture is too shambling to lunge for them. But these leftovers warm up eventually. The usual setups at last develop variations, and you might be reminded of why audiences first responded to Rogen back in Knocked Up.