By DAHJIA THOMAS
Staff Writer
Would you lie to a prison guard about a criminal escaping? Better yet, would you continue to help said prisoner escape even after learning they’re highly dangerous? Anyone with common sense would say of course not.
This scenario is only one of many insane scenarios featured in Eric André’s comedy film “Bad Trip,” released to Netflix on March 26, 2021.
Utilizing both scripted conversations and genuine reactions of the public, the film uses the shock value to create a new way of visual storytelling.
Unlike most hidden prank shows, “Bad Trip” actually has a full story and continues on as if nothing happened. With a rollercoaster of action-packed scenes fueled by outrageous pranks, the perfect mixture comes to life for a film like this.
The first scene paints a general picture of how the film will continue. Working on a customer’s car as a mechanic at a carwash, Chris, played by André, just so happens to run into Maria, the girl of his dreams, who he hasn’t seen since high school. Confiding in this customer and how he feels that she won’t even remember who he is, the customer goes on to tell him to just go for it. Really, what could go wrong in this situation? The worst that could happen is Maria rejects him and they both go on with their lives right? If that’s what you thought, you are completely wrong. The film takes an absurd turn that many would label as the “worst case scenario.”
Asking the customer to turn the vacuum on turns out to be what causes Chris’ doom as the vacuum gets stuck to his uniform and he is quite literally naked and afraid, grabbing the customers jacket. Hearing Maria coming back, he quickly hops into the back of the car and leaves the poor customer to take the lead on getting Chris the girl he’s been waiting for.
The scene is so short, only taking up about five minutes of screen time, that bystanders and viewers at home are left with no time to think about what happened.
While some can see this as cringeworthy, the story proceeds on to Chris and Bud, played by Lil Rel Howery, deciding to take a roadtrip to New York to see Maria at her art gallery.
However, Trina, Bud’s escaped convict sister, played by Tiffany Haddish, gets in the way of their plans and possibly Chris’ future.
Finding out that the two stole her precious car, she sets out to hunt them down to kill them.
An amazing sequence plays out where Trina, obviously angry, stumbles into a restaurant with flyers of Chris and Bud, outwardly talking about how she’ll find and kill them for stealing her car. She speaks to everyone around her, including the police who refuse to help her any further than telling her where to go. Finding a cop car nearby, she decides to rip the door fully off and start driving away, leaving behind shocked bystanders and a cop without a ride.
Though “Bad Trip” has a basic plot and storyline where the guy goes to the ends of the earth to find the girl he loves, the adventure is entertaining enough to distract you from this. “Bad Trip” is able to stir the pot just enough to get comedic and sometimes even furious reactions.
Undoubtedly, its funniest scenes often drag real people in the drama, tested by the amazing skills of André, Howery, and Haddish. The reactions to their pranks might shock you in some ways, and absolutely will not in others.
