American Pie 2
AMERICAN PIE 2 (2001)
Starring: Jason Biggs, Chris Klein, Thomas Ian Nicholas, Eddie Kaye Thomas, Seann William Scott, Alyson Hannigan, Tara Reid, Mena Suvari, Natasha Lyonne, Shannon Elizabeth, Eugene Levy, Jennifer Coolidge & Molly Cheek.
Screenplay by Adam Herz.
Directed by J.B. Rogers.
Distributed by Universal Pictures. Rated R. 111 minutes.
Is American Pie 2 as good as the original?
No, not close.
But, is it still worth seeing?
Sure.
The new film revisits the boys from the original on the summer after their first year of college. The guys decide to rent a “party” cabin by the lake and try to drink and meet new girls while pining after the ones that got away.
That’s pretty much it as far as the story goes.
There are variations on the jokes from the first film, slightly ratcheted up in the grossness quotient, and yet usually not as funny. Instead of drinking tainted beer Stifler is mistakenly urinated on. Instead of Jim being humiliated on the internet, he and his friends are humiliated on short wave radio. Instead of a sexual joke about a flute, you have one about a horn.
Sadly, the movie loses a lot of it’s interesting perspective because most of the girls who were so instrumental in keeping the first film on course barely get cameos here. Strangely all of them… Mena Suvari, Shannon Elizabeth, Tara Reid, even Stifler’s mother… are out of town for most of the picture… and out of mind, too. This allows the guys to run wild without much in the way of an alternative perspective, but that sense of balanced viewpoint was what made the first film so good.
American Pie 2 is low humor, but it will make you laugh. In the end, that’s all it was made for. (8/01)
Jay S. Jacobs
Copyright © 2001 PopEntertainment.com All rights reserved. Posted: August 6, 2001.
Comments