Neighbors

As a broad lampoon of fraternity life, Neighbors is made for the same frat boys at which it pokes fun, hoping they either won’t get the joke or won’t care.

That’s a decent bet with the latest Seth Rogen vehicle, an energetic comedy of mischief and mayhem that takes a comedic approach emphasizing quantity over quality.

Rogen plays Mac, whose days of immaturity are supposedly behind him as he lives a happy suburban life with his wife, Kelly (Rose Byrne), and newborn daughter. But then the moving truck shows up next door, and Mac finds himself greeting Teddy (Zac Efron), the president of the Delta Psi fraternity who promises to be considerate. We all know that’s not gonna happen.

The logistics of this arrangement are never really explained, since the whole story seems to exist in a two-house vacuum. Oh, never mind. At first, Mac and Kelly try to make nice with their complaints about the obnoxious all-night parties and stray beer cans in a misguided effort to seem cool.

However, their irritation soon boils over, leading to a revenge-fueled antagonistic scenario after Mac calls the college dean (Lisa Kudrow) and gets the fraternity put on a probation list. Loyalties are threatened on both sides as the debauchery and childish warfare escalates.

Neighbors aims low and scores accordingly. It’s not exactly into commenting on neighborhood integrity or declining property values, preferring instead to offer slow-motion montages of drug-induced hallucinations.

Although he plays a father this time, the material doesn’t require Rogen to stray far from his comfort zone. He still parties, smokes weed and tells off-color jokes. But he achieves an amusing adversarial chemistry with Efron that generates some solid laughs. Dave Franco, Christopher Mintz-Plasse and Jerrod Carmichael each have their moments in the gross-out spotlight.

The screenplay by former Judd Apatow collaborators Andrew Jay Cohen and Brendan O’Brien strains to be raunchy in spots, and it’s hardly grounded in reality. Meanwhile, director Nicholas Stoller (Get Him to the Greek) gets plenty of mileage from reaction shots of the baby to the chaos around her.

Even if the story meanders in a predictable direction, it features several inspired comic moments, including a memorable prank involving airbags. The result isn’t exactly Animal House for a new generation, but at least it’s consistently funny.

Rated R, 96 minutes.