How do you do,
American Pie seems to be the last kind of movie to review, but given that the film is twenty years old now, I thought of giving my two cents to it. Alone, the film is like some strange type of pie where it looks mouth watering from the start, until you slice it. Then you see strange, black goo where the filling ought to be. Then, when you taste it, it's awful. So much so that you throw the rest out and you spend the next period of time washing out your mouth.
That's a way of describing how one feels about this teen sex comedy, yet there is another side to it. The title comes from the song by Don McLean, first premiered in 1972, where he sings of the event we call "The Day the Music Died." This is in reference to Feb. 03, 1959, when during a winter tour the three rock stars, Buddy Holley, Ritchie Valens, and the Big Bopper, were killed in a plane crash outside Clear Lake, Iowa. At the time of the movie's release, it had been forty years since the crash,and the song has been a classic. In fact, the same year American Pie came out, Weird Al did a parody called "The Saga Begins", only with a different subject matter.
The reason for bringing this is up is for the sake of trivia, because if you were to watch American Pie, you won't be seeing any plane crashing or hear the song played in the sound track. In fact, there is nothing much left of the song, other than the title. It's just like in Fantasia featuring Tchaikovsky's "Nutcracker Suite" without the Nutcracker. Recently, with the film now twenty, I am thinking that the title is something of a fluke. There does seem a certain bit of innocence in the first movie that is lacking in the sequels (but I still see the warts present as the review continues). I mean, this was to be the first of what seemed a trilogy, later a series of films, until it became basically the Millennium's National Lampoon.
The film has a basic plot: four teenage boys make a pact to lose their virginity by prom night. Those four good old boys drinking whiskey and rye, and singing "this'll be the day [we lose our V-cards]" are named Jim, Finch, Kevin, and Oz (nope, not the wizard). Right off the bat, you'd read that and think, how cliche: four teenage boys are planning to get laid at some point and there is going to be a comedy of errors leading up to it. There are indeed some issues with the plot, one of which is how it objectifies the girls into sex objects. It certainly takes the four boys plot from American Graffiti and gives it the blue pill, but I wonder what was the point in this?
Not only that, the pact doesn't happen for most of the first act, but it gives plenty of time for us to know the characters.
Jim, a lonely teenage broncin' buck, sans a pink carnation or a pick'em up truck, who kind of resembles Cory Matthews from Boy Meets World, is shown wanting it while also viewing some adult material. The opening scene has him watching something on the television, but due to the period of time, he can't see much. Hey, the joys of the pre-millennium technology. In those days, some of the channels couldn't be viewed unless you had a satellite dish or digital cable (those rich enough for those channels, of course, had a way of keeping them away from the kids). Those were the days!
Back to Jim, his father decides a cheaper thing to do is to give him some nudie magazines, which to me is like teaching a kid not to smoke by making him smoke an entire carton of cigarettes. All it does is just make him addicted to that trash. Not only that, these days, Jim's father would have been in hot water for showing that smut to a minor, even if he did so on a computer. Later on, after catching Jim indulging in self-love with the pie (which is where the film gets its title), he covers it up first and then has an honest discussion with Jim about masturbation. In the former, I must say something. Jim's mom obviously worked long and hard on that pie and to see it trashed like that is an insult, while lying about it is even worse. Now she is going to have to make another, and then what? Both Jim and his dad will have to eat it as well, even if it turns out to not taste very good. As to the latter, it's actually much better, especially when he compares sex to a tennis game, with masturbation basically being like playing the game against a wall. Basically, it gets very boring after a while (and for plenty of people, addictive), and that it's not a game. Though the discussion doesn't bring up any religious issue to it, or even discusses the health affects or benefits, I think that scene has the most honest discussion out there in pop culture, whereas our puritanical culture would make movies and shows hide it with euphemistic terms.
The film does offer one affect of porn viewing and masturbation where Jim lacks the ability to walk up and talk to girls (though I am not certain any expert out there can offer evidence to support that, but we'll give the dog a bone on this one). I am aware that teenage boys often are going through puberty and are going to be awkward around women, and sometimes there are teenage boys who might not be attracted to girls but instead prefer their fellow men. Others are asexual. Still, I have noted that characters like Jim are always shown that way where they focus on a pretty girl and try to talk to her, but can't. Then, for a time, his porn becomes a clutch (after all, the popular line of thought is, why waste time and humiliate yourself by talking to real women when you can have your fantasies; the women in the pictures don't even have to give to consent for lusting because they don't even talk; and they won't age, unlike their real counterparts -- or make complaints of you bothering them or make it a legal matter, either). All the while, he focuses on a foreign exchange student named Nadia, played by Shannon Elizabeth.
Just to avoid rabbit trailing, I'll get to the other boys. Finch and Kevin, two typical nerd boys, with the latter as the leader of the group, who initiates the pact, and the former is something of a germaphobe, to the point that he doesn't use public restrooms. That last is understandable because, well most places like gas stations and rest stops rarely keep their restrooms clean (there are some exceptions, of course). Kevin also has a girlfriend named Vicky, with whom he wants to get to the next level, which puts a wedge between them briefly.
Case in point on the last, at a party at the Stiffler's, (name of that weirdo guy played by Sean William Scott, whose parents are always absent, leaving him to host parties where people get drunk and make out). When Kevin and Vicky are there, Kevin attempts to get to that level while Vicky is slow to try it. Vicky even talks with another girl, Jessica, who tells her that sex is not a rocket launch (I still fail to see the analogy). Vicky agrees, then gives her boyfriend what some people call "the blow." Of course, Vicky would want the favor returned, so Kevin tries to find something in the same manner. He contacts his older brother who tells him of the Book of Love (apparently, lots of boys wrote it, to answer the song's question) and he finds one routine that he tries on his girl, with great results. One joke in the scene has Vicky's father coming up to bring her to dinner and she yells out a response before he knocks on it. Apparently, to most people, there's "coming" and there's "cumming", and its the former the father thought he heard when she really said the latter. Personally, I don't know how that happened, especially as it's actually the Latin word cum, which is pronounced "coom", which means "with" (as in "Et cum te spiritu", meaning "And with your spirit."), but it's gotten into the English language somehow. Yet, on some television stations, Vicky's line is even altered to something like "be right there!"
After that encounter, Vicky tells Kevin she loves him. Yet, Kevin can't say it to her, which upsets her. For a time, it seems they might break up, until, after another talk, Vicky finally goes to Kevin and tells him what he wants to hear, though she suggests after the prom.
As to Finch (apparently a reference to Atticus Finch), he bribes some girl to make him seem a stud, which makes him lock horns with Stiffler, who was seen vomiting after drinking some neglected beer that Kevin....know what, I'll just skip that part and say, don't just pick up any random drink when at a party. After all, there are worse things to wind up in drinks in those situations (which begs the question, why does Hollywood perpetuate the image of underage teenagers having parties with alcohol and no adult supervision? I mean, a bunch of poor, innocent teenage girls gathering in a house with like minded teenage boys, in a setting featuring drugs and booze, hosted by some pervert or strumpet, where someone can get drunk and taken advantage of? Not to sound crazy, but isn't that one of the things that's led to the MeToo movement in recent years?) So, while the Stiffler was looking down, the Finch stole his horny crown. To get at Finch, he puts lax into his coffee, prompting the whole random scene where Finch is running for home, yet winds up in the girls' room. The scene is grotesque and hardly necessary to me, other than the fact that it explains how Finch lost his chance at a prom date.
Finally, Oz, the one jock in the quartet, who does the lacrosse team along with Stiffler. Oz, unlike the stereotypical jock, doesn't have any arm candy, but decides to try out for the pact too. He does so by exploring the campus, eventually entering the choir and meeting Heather, leading to all sorts of jokes on his masculinity and orientation. Oz's arc becomes basically showing that he can be a real man without going into the macho sport athletic set, which seems to impress Heather, until she learns of his reputation and the pact. At one point, she dumps him while saying, "you're such a jock, no a jerk!" Then, after a speech from the coach, Oz decides to renounce the pact and that is when Heather agrees to go with him to prom.
Jim gets most of the comedy on him. Besides the thing with the pie, he continues longing for Nadia, who invites herself to his place for study. Turns out, it's so she could change after some event or another, and the boys decide to use this as an opportunity to film her, leading to the most well remembered image of the movie (Shannon Elizabeth taking off her clothes, down to her panties; as if to be Gen Y's answer to the swimsuit fantasy scene from Fast Times at Richmond High). It's also the most controversial. Here, a girl is changing clothes and her privacy is being disrespected, herself objectified, and her consent not even asked for. What's worse, not only are Jim and his friends seeing it, but so is Stiffler's little brother, a group of girls, some boy band with a monkey, and Sherman, the Jester on the Sidelines Minus a Cast, who instigated the plot. Apparently, Jim sent the link to everyone instead of choosing who to send it to (twenty years later, the hilarity of the scene only goes so far, considering we got websites that are about posting videos of people doing embarrassing things).
So, it gets back to Jim who returns to find Nadia on the bed, getting comfortable (she does grab a shirt for modesty). Looking back on the strip-tease, I can't help but think with the way it was done she somehow knew she was being filmed. Instead of scolding him, like you would expect a girl to do (or some of the things today's women do), she turns the tables on Jim and has him do a strip tease for all to see. Afterward, he is in his boxers when he is invited to bed, then she has him touch her, prompting the one embarrassment that comes on teenage boys. Not once, but twice does this happen, making Jim the laughing stock of the school. Nadia is later sent home by her sponsors, leaving Jim without a date.
Enter Michelle, the band geek played by Allyson Hannigan, who starts her stories with "there was this one time at band camp...". You know, I have a sibling who went to band camp and she never began her stories that way. She never even says that in her video reviews. With nothing else, Jim decides to take to the prom the girl who sang the blues.
So prom night arrives and there they all were "one place, a generation lost in space, with no time left to start again," which is about the only way to describe this point of senior year. It's here the antithesis of the pact, a red headed, freckled faced nerd, named Sherman, who calls himself the Sherminator (a portmanteau of Sherman and Terminator; a self-proclaimed "sophisticated sex robot sent back in time to change the life of some lady"), the boy who claimed to have done it with a girl earlier in the movie, is revealed to be false. The girl he supposedly done it with says they didn't do it and that it was all a bribe to make it seem that he has prowess. And as he watched her on the stage, his hands were "clinched in fists of rage," cause she mentions he has a habit of wetting himself, which happens then and there. No angel born in hell can break that kind of spell.
This puts the four in a crossroads and for a moment it seemed nothing else will come of it. Even Jim is willing to say he has had it with sex while Oz has gone so far as to renounce it. Finch is down because he has no date. He even talks to a cynical girl named Jessica, who only gives him a flask full of booze. Heather seems in love with Oz because they were dancing in the gym real slow. Yet, all four still head to Stiffler's party after the prom, while we don't get any of the prom cliches (meaning we don't get to see a prom king and queen). It's here that Jim and Michele get to know each other more, with some strange stories exchanged. Then they retire to the bedroom, to partake in that sacrificial rite: during which Kevin finally says those three little words every girl wants to hear, Oz lets Heather decide when to do it and is rewarded for it, Jim gets the slam-bam-thank-you-ma'am from Michele (in what could foreshadow the sex scene from Breaking Dawn), and Finch goes down to the basement and runs into Stiffler's Mom. The first seems cliched, the second is unrealistic, and the third I have nothing good to say on. The last, I'll mention, because it becomes his revenge for the coffee spike as he seduces her, thus when Stiffler comes down, he finds his mom with Finch as the pact was consummated (and, I guess, Satan laughing with delight).
Just like the song, the film ends on a low note. After using Jim, Michele just "smiled and turned away", leaving Jim to continue his video sex chat with Nadia. Finch also used Stiffler's Mom, believe it or not. Oz and Heather become a couple, despite winding up going to separate colleges come fall. Yet, after all the build up, Vicky decides to call it quits with Kevin, which was the worst of the four. They go to the sacred store...I mean, their favorite restaurant, where they have breakfast and make a toast to "the next step."
American Pie isn't a feel good classic, not in the way most of the movies from 1999 are, especially given all that was mentioned. The plot is cliched, is mostly done for comedy but little development on the characters, and there is a lot of objectifying of girls in this movie. In American Pie, girls are only eye candy to be lusted over, to acquire in a sexual conquest, and any who says yes to a guy will make the guy feel great.
Of course, several things do turn the sexism charges on its head. For one, Nadia is shown as the exotic foreigner to make four typical American boys drool over, yet she turns the tables on one of them by having him strip on camera as well. Heather and Vicky are another way of subverting it, considering how they let their men know when they are ready and are respected for it. The only problem with them I got is how the film presents the same old cliche that if the man says something the woman wants to hear, which is opposite of what he really wants, she'll immediately give it to him, revealing that her desires are mutual. I don't know what universe that kind of manipulation works, but in real life, Kevin and Oz would still be virgins on graduation as most girls tend to stick to their abstinence vow really well. Not only that, Vicky's arc is pointless when she breaks up with Kevin after they consummate their relationship, all the while we had become invested in them. Michelle, meanwhile, the one geeky girl who would likely not be chosen for a date, does what my girlfriend once said, "why invest in other people when it's gonna be over?" (something to that effect), by simply taking Jim's virginity and then leaving, all the while no relationship comes from that.
The rest of the girls are only just extras who look pretty while standing around and letting guys hit on them. The one exception is Jessica, the cynical girl who can't wait to be in college, something I consider be just a trope of that snarky, teenager who thinks everything is false, never enjoys life, and often thinks things will be better once they are out of high school. She has no arc, other than lie for Finch and give Vicky some sex advice, and the sequels don't really know what to do with her, other than make her a no show in one, or a Lesbian in another.
Sherman and Stiffler are also stereotypes, with one being the creepy nerd who annoys the other boys with his high IQ and bothers girls with his ugly looks, and the other being a jock who acts like the big man on campus (after seeing him in Road Trip and Dukes of Hazard, I can't help but think that seems the character Sean William Scott was made to play in the turn of the millennium; in all those films, he is showing going around with a grin on his face while attempting to get in a girl's pants or get at some guy). Come to think of it, that is just about all that is need to be said of those two, since they only exist for the sake of comedy or conflict.
As a whole, there is a reek of sexism with American Pie, something that today's audiences might not want. At the same time, there is some innocence with the film that connects with the song in more than just the title. Don McLean wrote "American Pie" after seeing the tragedy in the plane crash that killed three rock stars, after which rock n roll was transformed: going into teen pop and folk music in the early sixties, psychedelic tunes and political songs of the late sixties, then the dark and edgy songs of the early seventies, all a far cry from the wholesome, feel good, Oldies that dominated the airwaves in the fifties. The same with the American Pie franchise after the first movie. They decided to give it a sequel after getting into the millennium, which reunited the cast (including Jim with Nadia), and brought back the same sex comedy. Then they got another, though they renamed it American Wedding, where after Jim realized he was into Michelle, they get married. After that, the franchise became like National Lampoon with a few made for TV movies, some that went straight to video, with the rehashed plot points and the same tired out sexism, before going back to the big screen in 2012 with American Reunion. Not one of the sequels has had the same magic as the first movie and not one has had the staying power, either (though American Pie 2 made more money than the first movie).
That leads to the one contrast in that innocence loss. With rock n roll, the loss of innocence came with the music transforming over the course of a decade. With this movie franchise, the loss of innocence only came from reusing the same thing constantly until it got stale.
Now, the song, inspired by an event now forty years old, may continue to be enjoyed still, even after only one artist attempt to make her own version. The film, meanwhile, hasn't aged well. It's become that embarrassing friend from high school who never grew up, or basically the cinema's version of Harvey Weinstein. True, at one time, people would have thought of him good and all, considering he gave us so many good movies in the nineties, and for liberals he campaigned against Trump in the 2016 elections. However, all that no longer matters after all the sexual abuse allegations are made to light. We can like the late forties to early sixties America, racist and sexist warts and all, even as we jam to "American Pie", but it's even harder to like a sex comedy like American Pie, regardless of the innocence it may carry. The mindset of the song's world had a balance, for with all the dark side of post-World War II America, there were a lot of good things in that era that were traded in for progress (though it's be rabbit trailing to list them all). The mindset of the movie, however, doesn't provide that balance. It's a secular film (American Wedding attempted to add religion by making Jim and his family Jewish, though I have found no evidence to support that revelation in its prequels), the view of teenagers in high school is slanted, the story is cliched, the sexism is rampant, etc. It is no wonder the older audience would have called it trash.
Could it have been fixed in a remake? Not a word has been spoken. I know people would start in the characters. In the first film, we had a quartet of white boys who hook up with four white girls, something a lot of people today would want to change. I am sure if they remade this movie, they'd feature one of the boys and one of the girls as a person of color. They can also show how far we have come since 1999 and actually have a gay character in there, somewhere. Another radical move is change the premise from four boys vowing to get laid by prom into four girls making that vow (a kind of sex positive update on How to Marry a Millionaire). Either one of those updates would be the tip of the iceberg, but considering the content of the first movie being transferred to the remake, I doubt those updates would actually improve its quality.
Perhaps its best to not keep making remakes and only keep American Pie around for aesthetic reasons only. In a sense, reboots of older films have their pluses, but often contribute to the robbing of innocence of a genre. In the end, considering how Ghostbusters fared, a remake, to paraphrase the song, will cause the children to scream, the lovers to cry, and the poets to dream, and not a kind word be spoken, and the older fans would take "the last train ride for the coast." To quote John Wayne, "That'll be the day, Pilgrim!"
This puts the four in a crossroads and for a moment it seemed nothing else will come of it. Even Jim is willing to say he has had it with sex while Oz has gone so far as to renounce it. Finch is down because he has no date. He even talks to a cynical girl named Jessica, who only gives him a flask full of booze. Heather seems in love with Oz because they were dancing in the gym real slow. Yet, all four still head to Stiffler's party after the prom, while we don't get any of the prom cliches (meaning we don't get to see a prom king and queen). It's here that Jim and Michele get to know each other more, with some strange stories exchanged. Then they retire to the bedroom, to partake in that sacrificial rite: during which Kevin finally says those three little words every girl wants to hear, Oz lets Heather decide when to do it and is rewarded for it, Jim gets the slam-bam-thank-you-ma'am from Michele (in what could foreshadow the sex scene from Breaking Dawn), and Finch goes down to the basement and runs into Stiffler's Mom. The first seems cliched, the second is unrealistic, and the third I have nothing good to say on. The last, I'll mention, because it becomes his revenge for the coffee spike as he seduces her, thus when Stiffler comes down, he finds his mom with Finch as the pact was consummated (and, I guess, Satan laughing with delight).
Just like the song, the film ends on a low note. After using Jim, Michele just "smiled and turned away", leaving Jim to continue his video sex chat with Nadia. Finch also used Stiffler's Mom, believe it or not. Oz and Heather become a couple, despite winding up going to separate colleges come fall. Yet, after all the build up, Vicky decides to call it quits with Kevin, which was the worst of the four. They go to the sacred store...I mean, their favorite restaurant, where they have breakfast and make a toast to "the next step."
American Pie isn't a feel good classic, not in the way most of the movies from 1999 are, especially given all that was mentioned. The plot is cliched, is mostly done for comedy but little development on the characters, and there is a lot of objectifying of girls in this movie. In American Pie, girls are only eye candy to be lusted over, to acquire in a sexual conquest, and any who says yes to a guy will make the guy feel great.
Of course, several things do turn the sexism charges on its head. For one, Nadia is shown as the exotic foreigner to make four typical American boys drool over, yet she turns the tables on one of them by having him strip on camera as well. Heather and Vicky are another way of subverting it, considering how they let their men know when they are ready and are respected for it. The only problem with them I got is how the film presents the same old cliche that if the man says something the woman wants to hear, which is opposite of what he really wants, she'll immediately give it to him, revealing that her desires are mutual. I don't know what universe that kind of manipulation works, but in real life, Kevin and Oz would still be virgins on graduation as most girls tend to stick to their abstinence vow really well. Not only that, Vicky's arc is pointless when she breaks up with Kevin after they consummate their relationship, all the while we had become invested in them. Michelle, meanwhile, the one geeky girl who would likely not be chosen for a date, does what my girlfriend once said, "why invest in other people when it's gonna be over?" (something to that effect), by simply taking Jim's virginity and then leaving, all the while no relationship comes from that.
The rest of the girls are only just extras who look pretty while standing around and letting guys hit on them. The one exception is Jessica, the cynical girl who can't wait to be in college, something I consider be just a trope of that snarky, teenager who thinks everything is false, never enjoys life, and often thinks things will be better once they are out of high school. She has no arc, other than lie for Finch and give Vicky some sex advice, and the sequels don't really know what to do with her, other than make her a no show in one, or a Lesbian in another.
Sherman and Stiffler are also stereotypes, with one being the creepy nerd who annoys the other boys with his high IQ and bothers girls with his ugly looks, and the other being a jock who acts like the big man on campus (after seeing him in Road Trip and Dukes of Hazard, I can't help but think that seems the character Sean William Scott was made to play in the turn of the millennium; in all those films, he is showing going around with a grin on his face while attempting to get in a girl's pants or get at some guy). Come to think of it, that is just about all that is need to be said of those two, since they only exist for the sake of comedy or conflict.
As a whole, there is a reek of sexism with American Pie, something that today's audiences might not want. At the same time, there is some innocence with the film that connects with the song in more than just the title. Don McLean wrote "American Pie" after seeing the tragedy in the plane crash that killed three rock stars, after which rock n roll was transformed: going into teen pop and folk music in the early sixties, psychedelic tunes and political songs of the late sixties, then the dark and edgy songs of the early seventies, all a far cry from the wholesome, feel good, Oldies that dominated the airwaves in the fifties. The same with the American Pie franchise after the first movie. They decided to give it a sequel after getting into the millennium, which reunited the cast (including Jim with Nadia), and brought back the same sex comedy. Then they got another, though they renamed it American Wedding, where after Jim realized he was into Michelle, they get married. After that, the franchise became like National Lampoon with a few made for TV movies, some that went straight to video, with the rehashed plot points and the same tired out sexism, before going back to the big screen in 2012 with American Reunion. Not one of the sequels has had the same magic as the first movie and not one has had the staying power, either (though American Pie 2 made more money than the first movie).
That leads to the one contrast in that innocence loss. With rock n roll, the loss of innocence came with the music transforming over the course of a decade. With this movie franchise, the loss of innocence only came from reusing the same thing constantly until it got stale.
Now, the song, inspired by an event now forty years old, may continue to be enjoyed still, even after only one artist attempt to make her own version. The film, meanwhile, hasn't aged well. It's become that embarrassing friend from high school who never grew up, or basically the cinema's version of Harvey Weinstein. True, at one time, people would have thought of him good and all, considering he gave us so many good movies in the nineties, and for liberals he campaigned against Trump in the 2016 elections. However, all that no longer matters after all the sexual abuse allegations are made to light. We can like the late forties to early sixties America, racist and sexist warts and all, even as we jam to "American Pie", but it's even harder to like a sex comedy like American Pie, regardless of the innocence it may carry. The mindset of the song's world had a balance, for with all the dark side of post-World War II America, there were a lot of good things in that era that were traded in for progress (though it's be rabbit trailing to list them all). The mindset of the movie, however, doesn't provide that balance. It's a secular film (American Wedding attempted to add religion by making Jim and his family Jewish, though I have found no evidence to support that revelation in its prequels), the view of teenagers in high school is slanted, the story is cliched, the sexism is rampant, etc. It is no wonder the older audience would have called it trash.
Could it have been fixed in a remake? Not a word has been spoken. I know people would start in the characters. In the first film, we had a quartet of white boys who hook up with four white girls, something a lot of people today would want to change. I am sure if they remade this movie, they'd feature one of the boys and one of the girls as a person of color. They can also show how far we have come since 1999 and actually have a gay character in there, somewhere. Another radical move is change the premise from four boys vowing to get laid by prom into four girls making that vow (a kind of sex positive update on How to Marry a Millionaire). Either one of those updates would be the tip of the iceberg, but considering the content of the first movie being transferred to the remake, I doubt those updates would actually improve its quality.
Perhaps its best to not keep making remakes and only keep American Pie around for aesthetic reasons only. In a sense, reboots of older films have their pluses, but often contribute to the robbing of innocence of a genre. In the end, considering how Ghostbusters fared, a remake, to paraphrase the song, will cause the children to scream, the lovers to cry, and the poets to dream, and not a kind word be spoken, and the older fans would take "the last train ride for the coast." To quote John Wayne, "That'll be the day, Pilgrim!"
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