Neighbors Review Roundup: Find Out What Critics Think of the New Zac Efron vs. Seth Rogen Comedy

Check out what reviewers are saying about the highly anticipated flick

By Peter Gicas May 08, 2014 2:12 PMTags
Neighbors, Zac Efron, Seth Rogen, Rose ByrneGlen Wilson/Universal Pictures

Neighbors is moving into a theater near you on Friday.

Helmed by Forgetting Sarah Marshall director Nicholas Stoller, Neighbors stars Seth Rogen and Rose Byrne as a young couple with a baby who find themselves living next to a rowdy fraternity house.

Zac Efron is the fraternity president lording over a group of troublemaking brothers played by the likes of Dave Franco, Christopher Mintz-Plasse and Jerrod Carmichael.

The result is an ever-escalating feud between the neighbors. Not to mention, plenty of opportunities for Efron to show off his chiseled torso.

So, what do the critics think? Read on...

Universal Pictures

• "It's a frat-house flick with more on its mind than beer, bongs, and beer bongs," writes Entertainment Weekly's Chris Nashawaty. "It's also a razor-sharp commentary on desperately trying to remain carefree after the burdens of adulthood have taken over."

• "An uproarious and hugely commercial vision of intergenerational warfare," says John DeFore of The Hollywood Reporter. "Neighbors represents a more real-world point of view than Animal House and Old School, one that understands frat-boy excess not as a joyous manifestation of Bacchanalian life-force, but as a pointless, retrograde enterprise that should be stomped mercilessly—even if the middle-class banality that quashes it isn't everyone's ideal of adulthood."

• "Zac Efron gives one of his most credible and intriguing performances in this winningly stupid frat comedy," notes Variety's Andrew Barker. "Technically speaking, the pic is much better shot and edited than a college comedy really needs to be, with the frequent party scenes in particular taking on an almost surrealistic timbre."

Neighbors is not a great film and does not really aspire to be," opines A.O. Scott of The New York Times. "It is more a status report on mainstream American movie comedy, operating in a sweet spot between the friendly and the nasty, and not straining to be daring, obnoxious or even especially original. It knows how to have fun. How very grown-up."

• "Byrne is the movie's MVP, thanks to a script that does what few comedies allow: let the wife earn some laughs," shares L.A. Weekly's Amy Nicholson. "Tequila shot for tequila shot, Byrne is at the center, driving the action."

•  [Seth Rogen] exudes likeability and the relationship jokes, worn out though they may be (new parents don't have time for sex? You don't say!) still land," remarks Jordan Hoffman of Film.com. "You'll laugh if you're young, you'll laugh if you're old."

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