College
The
makers of College obviously want to remind people of the
smart-but-naughty laughs of Superbad, but instead their film seems
more like American Pie Presents Beta House somehow got a theatrical
release.
College is an
hour and a half of puking, feces, barnyard animals, binge drinking, hazing,
oral sex, overflowing toilets, drugs and tits.
Not
that there’s anything wrong with that.
I
personally have no problem with College taking the low road to higher
learning. Variations of a lot of this stuff really happen, so why not
explore it on film? I just wish that College could have lived up to
the material.
Imagine taking all of the best parts of the college experience and then
doing so little with them.
The
movie takes the three types from Superbad – the cute-but-sensitive
virgin (Drake Bell from Nick’s Drake and Josh), the fat party animal
(Andrew Caldwell) and the four-eyed nerd (Kevin Covais – “Chicken Little”
from season five of American Idol) – and has them visit a college.
Add
in hot college girls who are stunningly tolerant of these jerky kids, a
bunch of frat assholes, enough beer to fill a river, dumb pranks, mud &
feces and lots of gratuitous nudity and you have a movie which is not so
much titillating as it is kind of depressing.
Oh, yeah, there is also a completely
mystifying cameo appearance by
Verne Troyer.
And Verne thought the sex tape was the worst thing that happened to him this
year...? Think again, Mini-Me.
There is a long history of teen sex comedies and many can be very good, but
College doesn’t bother with things like characterization and plot.
It’s just looking for the gross-outs.
Well, that’s not 100% true. Marooned in all the filth is actress Haley
Bennett (Music and Lyrics) who actually is able to create a nuanced,
sympathetic character as the nice, beautiful girl who befriends the cute
nerd. Their tentative love story seems
completely tacked on and out of
place here, but at the same time
it is the only real genuine human emotion allowed on screen in College.
Dave Strohler
Copyright ©2009 PopEntertainment.com.
All rights reserved. Posted: January 28, 2009.
