“Tag” is the Date Movie You Take Your Friends To

From the trailer, Tag looked to be a good time slapstick-filled romp. What I imagined it lacked it substance, it would make up for in laughs. I was half-right. The Setup The movie absolutely delivers on the brand of hilarity it promises. The theater I was in exploded in laughter more than once. In fact, we were moved to applause when the game became more chess than tag. It’s hard not to be 100% invested when you see adults donning costumes and threatening teddy bears (it was emotionally harrowing, but we made it). When you factor in that this is based loosely on a true story? That a game of tag did, in fact, span decades? That a group of friends committed to something that lasted their whole lives? I’m here for it.

The Players We meet the players in the middle of tag season, a thirty year old tradition in which the month of May is a free for all no-tag-backs full body contact experience. First there’s Ed Helms’s Hogan ‘Hoagie’ Malloy. To demonstrate how serious the game nay the sport of tag is to this group of friends, Hoagie has taken a janitorial job at his friend’s job to get close to him. His target, Bob Callahan played by Jon Hamm is a high powered exec type. Except when it comes to tag. Then, he’s very much a 9 year old. Callahan is being interviewed by the Wall Street Journal. Journalist Rebecca Crosby (Annabelle Wallis) is so much more interested in the game that wreaked havoc on her interview than she is on whatever boring company profile she intended to write and s…