Last night’s movie: American Pie 2

After reading and writing up yesterday’s anti-movie rant by Sacramento Bee movie reviewer Joe Baltake, I decided I had to go out and see American Pie 2 for myself. Short answer: he was wrong. The movie is funny and I was laughing thoughout. Yes, the filmmakers depend on sex and gross out humor for the bulk of their jokes but what teen comedy except for American Grafitti didn’t? Sure, the “Are they lesbians?,” superglue, and peeing off the balcony scenes go further than, say, Animal House did or could 20 years ago, but that’s also just a sign of our changing cultural values. Pong was a lot less violent than Quake, too. I think screenwriter Adam Herz, who also wrote the original, does a good job with the story, keeping a lot of the concepts and characterizations from AP1 but finding new ways to express them. Good example is Finch’s obsession over Steiffler’s mom (and therefore Tantra) throughout the movie and the way Oz (the ever-improving Chris Klein) and Heather (Mena Suvari) can’t quite get together even though they want to badly.

And did the producers hire every large breasted actress between 17 and 21 in Hollywood? It sure looks that way on screen. But none of them can compare to Shannon Elizabeth (whose personal website is poorly designed, IMO, but does have lots of photos), back as sex goddess/exchange student Nadia. Getting smart, Elizabeth put a no nudity (not even topless) clause in her contract although she looks awesome in anything and does one great bikini scene. Always on the lookout for titillation, I would suggest Stekson’s Shannon Elizabeth Picture Page as a good place to look.

Pauline Kael

On the other hand, Pauline Kael recently passed away. Kael was probably the most prominent and important film critic of the last half century and, had she deigned to review this film, would undoubtedly have not gotten past the opening scene–the sequel’s version of dad walking in on Jim. Louis Menand wrote an excellent appreciation of Kael for the NY Review of Books several years ago when a huge collection of Kael’s reviews and columns were published in For Keeps.