My short take on the series:
American pie is a guilty pleasure series about 5 sex-obsessed friends Jim,Kevin,Oz,Finch and Stifler.It might be stupid,even cliched in some bits but who cares when it can provide some harmless perverted fun ๐
American Pie (1999) – The first and the best film in the series.Everyone has equal roles,effortless chemistry.I liked Jim’s character the most followed by Stifler.Oz’s romantic track bored me a bit.It didnt look believable.Kevin had good role and almost shaped up as the “lead” along with Jim.Finch was funny but mostly a side actor throughout the series.
American Pie 2 (2001) – First 30 mins were a bit repetitive but it took over well from there.It is more gross than part 1 and it works bcos this is what the brand is all about.It focussed mostly on the love story of Jim and Michelle . Kevin and Oz got raw deal.But the Climax more than makes up for it and is like a “wet” dream coming true ๐ ,with every guy getting laid with his dream woman.
American Wedding (2003) – Weakest film in the series.Though the film is about marriage of Jim,the lead role is of stifler who tried his best to make it funny.Kevin was wasted and Oz was missing.The vibe of the series was somewhere lost in this film.
American Reunion (2012) – Better than the 3rd part.The screen time of each was fair unlike earlier 2 parts and brought back memories of the first part and is sort of completion of the American Pie “Project”.(Borrowed this tagline from satyam).There is though a racist joke about Indians having small dicks.
Finally, My fav scene in the series which I think epitomised the pervert in every teenager out there ๐
PS : Special thanks to spuntik for recommending me the first part.It went on from there.
Tags: American Pie American Reunion American Wedding
@Baba,
I recommended you all the parts except the final one coz I have not seen it ๐
You posted the scene that defined the series – should have given a warning though ๐
My favorite dialogues
“When a girl tells you how many guys she’s slept with, multiply it by three and that’s the real number.”
“If a guy tells you how many girls he’s hooked up with, it’s not even close to that. You take that number and divide it by three, then you get the real total.”
Good write up. Agree with you more or less. There were few spin offs of the American Pie Series which had only Jim’s Dad that went straight to video. They were not funny.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Pie_%28series%29#Straight_to_video_spin-off_films
yes sputnik ๐
Ebert’s review of American Pie
“American Pie” is a comedy about four high school senior boys who make a pact to lose their virginity before the end of the school year. This alone makes it almost touchingly old-fashioned; I did not know Hollywood still permitted high school seniors to be virgins.
Real teenagers are no doubt approximately as inexperienced and unsure as they have always been, and many wisely avoid the emotional and physical dangers of early sex, but in the movies the kids make the adults look backward. Teenagers used to go to the movies to see adults making love. Now adults go to the movies to see teenagers making love. I get letters from readers complaining that Clint Eastwood or Sean Connery are too old for steamy scenes, but never a word from anyone who thinks the kids played by Christina Ricci or Reese Witherspoon are too young.
“American Pie” comes in the middle of a summer when moviegoers have been reeling at the level of sexuality, vulgarity, obscenity and gross depravity in movies aimed at teenagers (and despite their R ratings, these movies obviously have kids under 17 in their cross-hairs). Consider that until a few years ago semen and other secretions and extrusions dare not speak their names in the movies. Then “There’s Something About Mary” came along with its hair-gel joke. Very funny. Then came “Austin Powers,” with its extra ingredient in the coffee. Then “South Park,” an anthology of cheerful scatology. Now “American Pie,” where semen has moved right onto the menu, not only as a drink additive but also as filling for a pie that is baked by the hero’s mom. How long will it be before the money shot moves from porn to PG-13? I say this not because I am shocked, but because I am a sociological observer, and want to record that the summer of 1999 was the season when Hollywood’s last standards of taste fell. Nothing is too gross for the new comedies. Grossness is the point. While newspapers and broadcast television continue to enforce certain standards of language and decorum, kids are going to movies that would make longshoremen blush. These movies don’t merely contain terms I can’t print in the paper–they contain terms I can’t even describe in other words.
I rise to the challenge. I seek an underlying comic principle to apply. I find one. I discover that gross-out gags are not funny when their only purpose is to gross us out, but they can be funny when they emerge unwittingly from the action. It is not funny, for example, for a character to drink a beer that has something in it that is not beer. But it is funny in “There’s Something About Mary” when the Ben Stiller character discovers he has the same substance dangling from his ear, and Cameron Diaz mistakes it for hair gel.
It is funny because the characters aren’t in on the joke. They are embarrassed. We share their embarrassment and, being human, find it funny. If Stiller were to greet Diaz knowing what was on his ear, that would not be funny. Humor happens when characters are victims, not when they are perpetrators. Humor is generated not by content but by context, which is why “Big Daddy” isn’t funny. It’s not funny because the Adam Sandler characters knows what he is doing, and wants to be doing it.
But back to “American Pie.” It involves a great deal of sexual content that in my opinion is too advanced for high school, and a lot of characters who are more casual about it than real teenagers might be. But it observes the rules of comedy.
When the lucky hero gets the foreign exchange student into his bedroom and she turns out to be ready for a romp, it is funny that he has forgotten and left his CU-See Me software running, so that the entire Internet community can watch him be embarrassed. It would not be funny if he left it on deliberately.
The film is in the tradition of “Fast Times at Ridgemont High,” “National Lampoon’s Animal House,” and all the more recent teen sex comedies. It is not inspired, but it’s cheerful and hard-working and sometimes funny, and–here’s the important thing–it’s not mean. Its characters are sort of sweet and lovable. As I swim through the summer tide of vulgarity, I find that’s what I’m looking for: Movies that at least feel affection for their characters. Raunchy is OK. Cruel is not.
https://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/19990709/REVIEWS/907090301/1023
I must say I enjoyed your small points more than Ebert’s review!! ๐
Thanks milind.