Much has been made of the fact that American Reunion - or American Pie: Reunion as it was released in countries where Hollywood marketing execs think you're an idiot - is one big nostalgia trip for a certain generation, the last of the early Gen Y, pre-iPhone mob, those of us who remember the days when the internet was used only as a tool for connecting with porn instead of friends, when musical artists were signed and released based on artistic merit, as opposed to being spat-out a hundredfold from TV shows, and when raunchy teen comedies were a rare novelty from the late eighties until, well, 1999, when they suddenly started being cranked out at an alarming rate.
I was thirteen when the original American Pie was released, and managed to see it, and its subsequent sequels, in cinema. I liked the film a great deal, a fairly-glorious throwback to films such as Porky's and Bachelor Party, which managed to combine both gross-out humour and a sense of genuine heart. As time went on, and the franchise began to fade under the weight of a thousand miserable direct-to-DVD spinoffs, it seemed like American Pie and its ilk would be consigned to the footnotes of history as a once-memorable series that had its day in the sun, and quietly died.
Which is why nobody really saw this coming, an attempt at revisiting a relic of a bygone era (okay, the nineties weren't that long ago, but with the rate time passes nowadays, it feels like it). This had already been attempted last year with another nineties trend-setter when Scream 4 was released, but despite positive buzz and reviews, that film was ultimately a financial misfire that seemed to signal the death knell for nostalgic rehashes. Perhaps producers Chris and Paul Weitz thought they could pluck their nostalgia strings a little more carefully, and produce a winner in the end. Ultimately, they are less than successful, and that's actually a little sad.
As obviously implied by the title, the new installment sees Jim (Jason Biggs), Finch (Eddie Kaye Thomas), Oz (Chris Klein) and Kevin (Thomas Ian Nicholas) return to their hometown of East Great Falls for their thirteen year (yes, the oddity of that number is noted) high school reunion. The four friends have all gone on to 'adult lives', Jim now a parent with wife Michelle (Alyson Hannigan) and stuck in a corporate job, Oz a semi-successful sports broadcaster, Kevin a hackled house-husband, and Finch a globe-trotting adventurer.
The catch is, of course, that none of them are really happy, facing the usual man-child grievances: Jim and Michelle are stuck in a sexual rut, Oz is dealing with a superficial, air-headed girlfriend, Kevin despises his house-husband position and is resentful of his controlling wife, and Finch is finding himself lacking in life fulfillment. They're common problems that many adults endure, but the film goes to great lengths to show these problems consuming the lives of our boys, and making them all neurotic messes. More mature minds would either persevere or do something about it - to quote Clerks, "shit or get off the pot" - but these are the American Pie guys, unable to handle the most mundane and basic of life's difficulties. It's a little frustrating to think that, after thirteen years, they haven't really aged all that much (despite the film's constant attempts at showing otherwise).
Once they arrive in town, they accidentally end up bumping into Stifler (Seann William Scott), who really hasn't aged at all, still the same obnoxious party animal that he was at school. Whilst he has at least attempted to live like an adult, at heart he's still the Stifmeister, and wastes no time dragging his old buddies back into the usual downward spiral of parties, pranks and sexual misadventures.
This is, naturally, everything we know and love about the franchise, but the problem is this: we've seen it all before, and we've seen it done better. What's disappointing is that Reunion doesn't even try to better the comedy landmarks set by the series all those years ago; like the characters, the series just hasn't grown up, despite being older. And in the wake of the "New Wave" of raunchy, R-rated comedy, films like The Hangover and Horrible Bosses, and, of course, most everything from the Judd Apatow stable, Reunion's rehashing of everything already tried seems especially dated and tired. You know a comedy is in trouble when you actually start actively predicting which joke or embarrassing situation is going to come next. Comedy today may have been inspired by the likes of American Pie, but it has since grown more sophisticated on many levels, and evolved into quite a different beast entirely. Gone are the days when relying solely on dick and fart jokes could carry an entire film; nowadays, the audience wants a modicum of intelligence with their onscreen stupidity.
What's especially baffling is that this point seems to have eluded writers/directors Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg, creators of the consistently-funny Harold and Kumar series. Whilst those films aren't necessarily comedic classics, they do frequently manage to hold their own in the modern-day arena, adding that afore-mentioned layer of sophistication to their dick and fart jokes, sophistication that Reunion doesn't even come close to having. It's almost as though they - like the cast - simply saw a chance to make a quick paycheck playing on people's nostalgia.
Audiences will, of course, enjoy the film on its most basic levels, but there's none of the memorable aspects that shaped the original, or even new films such as The Hangover. It's easy to imagine people forgetting this film even exists in a year's time. Nostalgia can carry a film only so far, but in the end, it has to stand on its own comedic merits, and Reunion has so very little of those. Sure, there's some mildly amusing gags, and Eugene Levy is always a joy to watch as Jim's dad, but it's far too little far too late. What could have been both a nice trip down memory lane and a demonstration of the evolution of modern comedy will instead be relegated to the "It was alright" pile, and considering the prestige once afforded to the American Pie brand, that's possibly one of the cruelest blows of all.
Then again, I guess, it's just yet another example of one of those emotions we all need to master in order to grow up: disappointment.
Rating: 2/5
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