Bride Hard
review by Bobby Blakey
Director Simon West has been churning out action flicks for years including Con Air, Laura Croft: Tomb Raider, The Mechanic and The Expendables 2. Now he is teaming up with Rebel Wilson for the action-comedy Bride Hard co-starring Anna Camp, Anna Chlumsky, Da’Vine Joy Randolph, Gigi Zumbado, Sherry Cola, Sam Huntington, Michael O’Neill, Colleen Camp, Stephen Dorff and Justin Hartley. Could this latest action comedy bring the pain, or will it be a pain to get through?
Bride Hard follows Sam, a world-class secret agent… and a terrible maid of honor. After blowing off bridal duties for an international spy mission, she’s demoted to bridesmaid at her childhood best friend’s wedding. What should’ve been a weekend of reconnecting and celebration turns into a five-star death trap when armed mercenaries crash the big day. Sam’s the only one who can save the bride and hopefully earn back the trust she lost along the way. Dodging bullets and trying not to ruin the floral arrangements, Sam takes on the ultimate wedding crasher, realizing that sometimes the toughest mission isn’t taking down the bad guys, but showing up for the people who matter.
I knew from the trailers this was going to be goofy and unbelievable, but that can still work when done right. See films like Spy with Melissa McCarthy that found the balance between action and comedy to make for a fun flick. Sadly, this one doesn’t have the same successful pairing and comes off dumber and more forced than much else. I am a fan of Rebel Wilson and think she can be hilarious, but there was just something off throughout this entire film and I think the first problem was making us try to believe she was a badass agent.
Had they leaned more into the comedy nature of her bring an agent it might have worked better, but while she did a decent job with the fights and action
pieces I could never buy into it in a serious way. With it being surrounded by silliness it also made it feel unbalanced as they seemed like they wanted a serious action film, but also a comedy and in turn you really don’t get either. That’s not to say there aren’t some decent moments of action and laughs, but overall falls flat.
I found myself more annoyed by the end of it because it would make me laugh out loud then have some fun with the action, then limp along for way too long missing the mark on all of it. It might work for some, and I applaud Wilson for going all in on the action, but it just never really worked for me.
Decide for yourself and check out Bride Hard when it hits Blu-ray on September 9th from Magenta Light Studios.