Honeymoon in Vegas is a 1992 American Romantic Comedy film directed by Andrew Bergman, starring James Caan, Nicolas Cage, and Sarah Jessica Parker.
Jack Singer (Nicolas Cage) is a private detective who has commitment issues due to his mother telling him not to marry on her death bed. Betsy Nolan (Sarah Jessica Parker) is Jack's girlfriend, a school teacher who's finally ready to get married. Jack agrees and the couple heads to Las Vegas, where he plays a poker game with Tommy Korman (James Caan), a professional gambler, and loses big to him. But Jack makes a deal: he'll erase all the debts if Betsy can stay with him for the weekend. Jack and Betsy reluctantly agree to the deal, but they end up in a Love Triangle, with Tommy wanting to steal Betsy for himself, as she looks exactly like his deceased wife Donna.
The movie's soundtrack even has covers of the songs of Elvis Presley done by various artists including Bruce Springsteen, Billy Joel, Trisha Yearwood, Willie Nelson, among others. The movie was later adapted into a Broadway musical with Tony Danza as Tommy.
This film contains examples of:
- Adaptational Jerkass: While Tommy is something of a Slimeball in the movie, he does at least love his son and his family, as shown when Tommy introduces them to Betsy. The musical version, however, shows the family as paid actors working with Tommy in an attempt to win Betsy over.
- Bail Equals Freedom: Hawaii Taxi driver Mahi Mahi ends up paying for Jack's bail and aids him to get him back in Vegas.
- Big "SHUT UP!": Jack does this to Sidney Tomashefsky, the man who fears his wife is having an affair with Mike Tyson, when Sidney goes onto a rant about how he imagines how someone else is touching his wife in vivid detail, which tortures Jack (this being after Tommy takes Betsy to Hawaii):Jack: SHUT UP! Are you trying to give me a HEART ATTACK?!"
- The Casino: Bally's Casino is where Jack and Betsy arrived to and met Tommy.
- Character Narrator: Jack gives cheesy Noir-flavored narrations through the film.
- Cheating with the Milkman: As a private detective, many of Jack's jobs involve around infidelity of this kind, with his very first scene after the prologue being him taking photos of a woman cheating of her husband with the cable installer.
- The Chessmaster: Tommy is actually quite crafty in his attempts to keep Jack away from him and Betsy. In addition to his lies about Jack to Betsy, Tommy seems to have power all over the country, knowing (with the help of Johnny Sandwich) when and where Jack is and using his clout to get a taxi driver to distract him or even getting a flight cancelled when he's up in El Paso.
- Cock Fight: When Jack first manages to track down Tommy and Betsy, both men get into a fight, which leads to Jack getting arrested while Tommy doesn't because of Screw the Rules, I Have Money!.
- "Could Have Avoided This!" Plot: Lampshaded by Jack in his narration by pointing out he wouldn't have ended up in the mess he did had he only stayed in New York and got married at a city hall.
- Coincidental Broadcast: After Betsy and Tommy departed to Hawaii, a depressed Jack is angsting about in his home. When he turns on the TV, it just so happens to land on a channel doing a report on Hawaii, which also just so happens to show Betsy together with Tommy. This is what ultimately prompts Jack to go to Hawaii himself.
- Commitment Issues: Jack is hesitant to marry Betsy, mainly due to his experiences from his mother's deathbed. And of course the affairs he witnesses from his job doesn't really encourage him either. It's only when Betsy puts her foot down that Jack finally decides to tie the knot with her (which of course the plans end up being complicated due to Tommy).
- Deadpan Snarker: When not screaming about the craziness around him, Jack responds to it in a nice, sarcastic manner. He mixes between this and the yelling when dealing with Mahi Mahi and Chief Orman.
- Doppelgänger Replacement Love Interest: Betsy is this for Tommy, who manages to look exactly like his late former wife.
- The Dragon: Tommy's go-to guy, Johnny Sandwich, who mixes between craftiness (like when and where Jack goes off to fly) and ineptitude (when trying to chase Betsy when she runs away and getting [[Big Eater distracted by eating]).
- Elvis Impersonator: A movie that's full of them, with Tommy and Betsy watching a show of them, which even included a six-year-old Bruno Mars performing as Elvis. And and the end, with Jack skydiving with a whole group of them, called the Flying Elvises. The latter even attended Jack and Betsy's wedding at the end of the film.
- Emasculated Cuckold: Part of Jack's Commitment Issues is a fear of being cheated on. He only agrees to the weekend deal With Tommy under the promise that sex won't be involved between Tommy and Betsy... but this doesn't stop him from soon becoming insanely jealous, to the point he can't help but image them having sex.
- Every Man Has His Price: Tommy attempts this with Betsy when they arrive to Vegas after their Hawaii trip and she becomes reluctant to marry him. He offers her $1 million, which disgusts her and eventually makes her run off from him.
- Gender Flip: The movie version of Mahi Mahi is male and played by Pat Morita. Mahi would be female in the Broadway musical.
- Graceful Loser: After Jack skydives and parachutes his way into Vegas to get back Betsy, Tommy admits defeat and gives her up.
- Groin Attack: Tommy does this to the hotel boss when he first arrives to get his penthouse, where the President of Brazil was actually staying at.
- Hero Stole My Bike: After getting out of Chief Orman's house, Jack tells Mahi Mahi he left his keys in the bathroom before the latter suggests to keep making a Hawaiian trip. Mahi Mahi goes after the keys while Jack hurriedly takes his cab and drives off to keep searching for Betsy.
- Hidden in Plain Sight: While tailing a target during a job, Jack puts on a fake mustache and hides behind a newspaper. When he sometimes brings Betsy on a job, he will don his "disguise" and then ask her to stay back while he tails the subject alone. When she asks about this technique, Jack responds that a woman as gorgeous as her will immediately be noticed by a man who suspects he's being followed and know somethings up, while a regular looking guy like him can simply blend into the background.
- Identical Stranger: Tommy becomes interested in Betsy due to her apparently being identical to his deceased wife Donna, to the point both Betsy and Donna (in flashbacks) are played by the same actress, Sarah Jessica Parker.
- It's Raining Men: Jack and the Flying Elvis skydive in Vegas for show (or in Jack's case, to get to Betsy).
- Know When to Fold 'Em: Despite his obsessive and underhanded attempts to steal Betsy from Jack, Tommy gives up after seeing Jack parachute out of a plane to stop them from getting married despite having never parachuted before, reasoning he can't compete with that amount of dedication.
- Large Ham: Par the course for Nicolas Cage as Jack, whom gets a few moments of this, such as when he gets into an argument with Betsy in their motel room when she agrees to go to Hawaii with Tommy.
- Last Request: The beginning of the movie has Jack seeing his mother in the hospital. She tries to make him promise not to marry anyone. But after he expresses his reluctance, she dies, which traumatizes him into not marrying.
- Lost Him in a Card Game: Jack plays a poker game with Tommy Korman, a professional gambler and after losing big to him, Jack makes a deal with Tommy that he will erase all the debts if he can let fiancee Betsy stay with him for the weekend.
- The Lost Lenore: Tommy's wife Donna, who loved sitting out in the sun, which eventually led her to getting skin cancer, which ended up killing her at a young age. Tommy is still grief-stricken by her death and when he finally sees Donna's Identical Stranger Betsy, he instantly falls for her.
- Love Triangle: Between Jack, Betsy and Tommy. While Jack and Betsy were happy together, she became tired of his Commitment Issues, to the point she actually gives Tommy a chance during the Scarpia Ultimatum, but she ultimately goes back to Jack.
- Manipulative Bastard: Tommy convinces Betsy that Jack put her up in the card game and later on makes the claim that the debts he was owed was actually smaller ($3'000) than it really was ($65'000). And later on, when Jack makes it to Korman's estate and yells for her name, Tommy stops him. And then shortly after Jack gets arrested, when Betsy says she heard him calling her name, Tommy spins it as just her hearing voices in the wind.
- May–December Romance: Tommy's much older than Betsy, to the point he has kids with families of their own.
- Ms. Fanservice: Betsy is considered a Head-Turning Beauty by most characters, in particular, her long legs are often commented about, and she often wears skirts or dresses that leave them bare as a result. She also has scenes where she wears swimsuits, bikinis and even a fairly Stripperiffic Vegas dancer outfit with a Showgirl Skirt.
- Modesty Bedsheet: After Betsy and Jack have sex in their first day in Las Vegas, they're both cuddling in bed under the bedsheets.
- Oh, Crap!: Jack gets incredibly worried in the poker game when his jack straight flush gets beaten by Tommy's queen straight flush and ends up owing him $65'000.
- Paper-Thin Disguise: Jack's idea of a disguise when investigating cases of adultery for clients is a big fake mustache and sunglasses.
- Professional Gambler: Tommy Korman, a retired clothing businessman, makes his living as a quite successful Vegas gambler.
- Punch-Clock Villain: The Hawaiian cab driver Mahi Mahi gets hired by Tommy to distract Jack and keep him away from him and Betsy. But then later on, he ends up aiding Jack after seeing the trouble he went through and even pays for his bail and takes him to the airport.
- Race for Your Love: Jack spends half of the film trying to find a way to Hawaii so he can try to win back Betsy, all while Tommy tries to sabotage his journey.
- Runaway Bride: Betsy ends up running from her impromptu wedding with Tommy, by dressing up as a showgirl to evade his bodyguards.
- Scarpia Ultimatum: Tommy arranges for Jack to erase his gambling debts if he agrees to let Tommy have a date with Betsy for the weekend. But of course, Tommy attempts to play keep away from Jack so he can have Betsy to himself.
- Sexy Surfacing Shot: One scene in Vegas has a close-up shot of Betsy hoisting herself out of the pool in a tiny bikini.
- Suddenly Shouting: Jack, when he gets frustrated or mad, frequently dives into this.
- Talking in Bed: One of Jack and Betsy's conversations about marriage occurs when they're both cuddling in bed. It also ends with her pulling him in for a kiss, with the scene panning away in an implied Sexy Discretion Shot.
- Modesty Bedsheet: There's a panning shot of Betsy's bare back as she lays in bed post-coital, before she pulls the Modesty Bedsheet to cover herself more.
- Unrelated in the Adaptation: Tommy's family that Betsy meets are all paid actors hired by Tommy in the Broadway musical.
- Viva Las Vegas!: Jack and Betsy go there to get married, though their plans get derailed after Jack ends up owing Tommy a huge amount of debt after a poker game and make a deal for Tommy to see Betsy for a weekend.
