Bridesmaids (2011)

Dir: Paul Feig

Writers: Annie Mumolo, Kristin Wiig

Starring: Kristin Wiig, Maya Rudolph, Melissa McCarthy, Chris O'Dowd, Rose Byrne

I remember seeing this movie in the theater last year on opening weekend with a group of my best girlfriends, all of us giddy at our recently engaged friend choosing us to be her bridesmaids. We all laughed to the point of crying, and I noticed many other movie-goers were busting up as well. I left the theater thinking, yes, finally a good comedy that isn't filled with a bunch of man-boys who refuse to grow up (Apatowian film culture).

Last weekend I watched it again with the one bridesmaid who didn't come with us that first time, and hadn't seen it yet. And though it was perhaps my tenth time watching the film in the past year, I still laughed to the point of hysteria.

Annie (Kristin Wiig) and Lillian (Maya Rudolph) are best friends--and Annie is floundering in adulthood with a failed bakery, creepy roommates, and the worst 'friend with benefits' situation ever (except for the fact that he is played by, and therefore looks like, Jon Hamm). Lillian just got engaged to some nothingburger and has asked Annie to be her Maid of Honor. Cue the hilarity.

The group of bridesmaids, even called by Lillian at one point as a "stone-cold group of weirdos," brings on the laughs from the engagement party to the wedding. Rose Byrne's treacherous Helen serves as a threat to Annie, but comes around by the end. Melissa McCarthy's Megan steals every scene she's in.

The Best: Kristin Wiig, hands down. Not only for her wonderful script, but for her acting. The airplane scene alone in which she becomes inebriated midflight and thinks she sees a colonial woman on the wing? Priceless. (I also have to mention that her impression of a penis had me gasping for breath.)

Fact: The woman sitting next to Kristin Wiig on the plane, who talked about having a dream with Annie in it, is the co-writer, Annie Mumolo. And Melissa McCarthy's air marshal is her real-life husband.

Rating: ********* (9 out of 10)