Evil Bong High-5! (2016)

Film review #427

Director: Charles Band

SYNOPSIS: Trapped in the bong world, Larnell, Rabbit, Sarah-Leigh, Velicity and the Gingerdead man are looking for a way to escape. Ebee, the evil bong herself, sends Larnell, Rabbit and the gingerdead man back to Earth, promising to release Sarah-Leigh and Velicity as well if they can raise a million dollars selling Ebee’s special weed at a new weed shop.

THOUGHTS/ANALYSIS: Evil Bong High-5! is a 2016 film and the fifth in the Evil Bong film series. Following on from the end of the last film, in which Larnell, Rabbit, Sarah-Leigh, Velicity and the Gingerdead Man have been imprisoned in the bong world, they are now looking for a way to escape, with the exception of Rabbit, who is quite enjoying it. They try to convince Rabbit to help them escape the bong world (as he did before) but he says Ebee has sealed all of the previous exits. However, Ebee turns up and claims to have a new plan to take over the world, and sends Larnell, Rabbit and the Gingerdead Man back to Earth, promising to release Sarah-Leigh and Velicity if they can raise a million dollars in twenty four hours selling weed to fund her evil plan. The plot of the film is basically that; with the trio attempting to sell various merchandise and weed in order to raise the necessary money. It’s very similar to the previous film, in that most of the film is just scene after scene of new characters coming into the shop and the same process of getting them to buy weed plays out. I’m not sure what Ebee’s plan is supposed to be, or how an evil bong can conquer the world using only a million dollars, but the nuances of the story aren’t really going to be an issue in this film, as with all the other previous films in the series, it’s just a cheap, silly film you can watch when you’re high.

There’s plenty of returning characters that viewers will recognise. Larnell and Rabbit are the most prominent characters that have been in every film (with the exception of the evil bong herself), and are still their usual selves. The Gingerdead Man seems to have become a staple of the series now after the previous film and the Evil Bong vs Gingerdead Man crossover, but he does very little, apart from the occasional bakery pun. The rest of the characters, many introduced in the previous film, enter scene by scene as they enter the bong shop and perform their one-dimensional characters again exactly like the previous film. Some of them are somewhat funny, but others are unremarkable. Larnell’s grandfather making a return is welcome as he spews out long-winded insults at him, but other than that he just appears in the one scene without any impact on the plot.

In keeping with tradition, this is not a very high-end production film, and scenes take place in one of two locations: the weed shop, or the bong world (which is just a green-screen). A lot of the film is essentially tied up in dialogue and bickering that goes nowhere; maybe if it ended in a punchline or something funny happening it could be forgiven, but that rarely happens either. There’s plenty of crude humour, nudity and weed jokes that will I’m sure appeal to it’s target audience. If you’re not high as a kite, there’s not going to be much here to appeal to you: it adds little to the series, and repeats a lot of what it has done before.