Best friends Miller (Miles Teller) and Casey (Skylar Astin) have grown apart since graduating high school and going off to their separate colleges. While Miller hasn’t changed from his high school partying ways, Casey has become a bit more straight-laced and already has a post-college job lined up at an investment firm. Their high school friend JeffChang (Justin Chon) is turning 21, and Miller and Casey have made the trip to Northern Pacific University to surprise him with a night of drunken stupidity. However, when they arrive they find the overbearing Dr. Chang (François Chau) in Jeff’s apartment. He is far too familiar with the boys’ high school antics and warns them that his son has an important med school interview in the morning and that they are not to take his son out drinking. But this doesn’t stop them. The bar-hopping is just the start of the night—the real adventure begins as Miller and Casey try to get JeffChang back home in time for his interview, while trying to avoid Dr. Chang and the other various enemies they’ve managed to make throughout course of this crazy night.

I am not a huge fan of the The Hangover franchise, and since this film is written by the same pair, I was surprised by how much I really enjoyed it. 21 & Over follows a similar formula to The Hangover—it opens with two naked guys walking through the middle of a college campus, their buttocks branded with Greek letters, clad only in a strategically placed tube sock. We then learn the details of what happened the crazy night before that led us to this point—when these guys took their buddy out for a night on the town before a life-changing event he couldn’t miss in the morning.

Miller and Casey are on a mission to get JeffChang home in time for his med school interview, but since Miller and Casey have never been to the campus, they have no idea where he lives. And so the fun of the film begins as the guys run all over campus trying to find someone who can help them. In the process they encounter a lot of strange individuals, and accidentally make quite a few enemies along the way, who keep popping back up over the course of the night.

At the first bar of the night, Casey meets Nicole (Sarah Wright) and the two really hit it off. This relationship is also explored while the rest of the events unfold—the chemistry between Casey and Nicole is excellent and feels so natural and right. In the midst of this chaotic night, the Casey and Miller also do a bit of soul searching, finding themselves questioning whether they have grown too far apart over the last four years. They begin to wonder if they are even still friends, and how much they actually know about one another’s lives.

I found the film a bit predictable at times, but that didn’t stop me from laughing out loud as the events played out. The film finds a nice blend of various kinds of humor—romantic comedy, gross-out humor, drunkenness and nudity, crazy characters and outrageous situations. If there was something that didn’t quite work in the context of the film, it was that these 21 year-olds were making pop culture references to and jokes about things from the 1980s. While these were fun and nostalgic for me, it didn’t make sense for these characters who weren’t even born yet! These kinds of jokes would have felt more appropriate in the world of The Hangover where the characters belong to the right generation.

21 & Over easily earns its R rating from excessive profanity (Miller drops the F-bomb almost every other word out of his mouth), excessive drinking, the obligatory random shots of topless girls running (that have absolutely nothing to do with anything else happening on screen) and the fact that all three of the guys have the butts hanging out quite a bit throughout the film.

The picture and sound quality on this blu-ray are great, but the bonus features are minimal. The two short behind-the-scenes featurettes don’t really give much insight on the film and feel more like promo pieces assembled to get people interested in seeing the film. And the gag reel isn’t all that funny. It would have been nice to get an audio commentary with the three main actors, some deleted scenes or more outtakes.

This combo pack also comes with a DVD and an iTunes digital copy. However, when I tried to redeem the digital copy, it only copies the file into iTunes and doesn’t make it available in iCloud (when the insert clearly states that it will).

Overall, I really enjoyed 21 & Over—it was a fun romp that had me laughing out loud with its elements of The Hangover, Ferris Bueller and even a dash of Weekend At Bernies.

What’s Included:

Film (1:33:06):

Blu-ray:
• 1080p / Widescreen 2.40:1
• Audio: English 5.1 DTS-HD MA
• English SDH, Spanish subtitles

DVD:

• 480p / Widescreen 2.40:1
• Audio: English DD 5.1
• English SDH, Spanish subtitles

Digital Copy: (Redemption Deadline 6/18/2015)

• iTunes or Android (Beta) Digital Copy (transferred via the DVD)

Extras (Only available on the Blu-ray):

• Levels of Intoxication (3:48)
  Writer/directors Jon Lucas and Scott Moore and cast members Justin Chon, Skylar Astin and Miles Teller talk about the different stages of being drunk. Includes behind-the-scenes footage.
• Tower of Power (3:08)
  Actors Skylar Astin, Justin Chon, Miles Teller and Sarah Wright talk about the drinking Olympics the guys must compete in during the film. Includes some behind-the-scenes footage.
• Gag Reel (2:24)
  The cast dance, flub lines and crack up on set.
• Theatrical Trailer (1:43)
• Sneak Peek (10:20)
  Trailers for The Internship, The Blu-ray Experience, Movie 43, A Good Day To Die Hard, Cheech & Chong’s Animated Movie, Archer Season 3. Includes a Play All option.

Final Thoughts:

Though 21 & Over gets a little predictable, it still provides a lot of laugh-out-loud moments. It is a fun ride with a bit of everything from action, drama, a romantic comedy and gross-out humor. The film mixes a bit of The Hangover with some elements of Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and Weekend at Bernies. The Blu-ray looks and sounds great, but contains very minimal extras—it’s a shame they didn’t include an audio commentary from the stars. Even without bonus features, the film itself is certainly worth checking out for a fun way to spend 90 minutes.