Five middle-class Irish men go away on a hiking weekend to celebrate Fionnan's (Hugh O'Conor's) stag-party. They spend a lot of time and money trying to find the appropriate gear, and look forward to enjoying themselves. Unfortunately their leisure-time looks as if it might ruined by the presence of The Machine (aka Richard) (Peter McDonald), a boorish bully, who just so happens to be Fionnan's future brother-in-law.
The basic scenario of John Butler's film provides the basis for a weekend of discovery, as all six men realize that their preconceptions have turned out to be false. Fionnan, a slightly metrosexual personality who did not really want to go away at all, finds out something about his best friend Davin's (Andrew Scott's) past that puts their relationship to the test. The two Kevins (Michael Legge, Andrew Bennett) understand that they are not really social outcasts after all, even in the eyes of Fionnan's father (John Kavanagh). The Machine turns out to be a vulnerable person, covering up his personality deficiencies under a veil of bravado. On the other hand, he has a devil-may-care attitude to life that exposes some of the middle- class pretensions of his five fellow- hikers.
Butler and McDonald's script contains some very funny moments, especially when we see Davin trying to negotiate plans for his wedding with the planner Linda (Justine Mitchell), who obviously has little or no clue about what he is saying. The film contains some neat set pieces - notably the sequence where The Machine inadvertently sets fire to the tent, forcing the hikers to live rough, something they had never really anticipated. They had simply viewed the hike as an extension of their middle-class existence; now they have really been catapulted 'back to nature'. Later on they throw off their clothes and go for a naked midnight swim; unfortunately the idea goes horribly wrong, forcing all of them to confront themselves totally unclothed, both physically and emotionally.
The basic scenario of THE BACHELOR WEEKEND (aka THE STAG) might be a familiar one - the importance of male bonding as a means of self- discovery - but the material has been handled with a light touch. In the end the film has an important point to make about friendship and trust as the basis of any effective relationship between people, irrespective of their gender. Needless to say, the action ends happily with everyone reconciled and Davin manages to wed his fiancée Ruth (Amy Huberman).
