# American Pie (1999)

### reviewed by
Bill Chambers

AMERICAN PIE *** (out of four) -a review by Bill Chambers (pie@filmfreakcentral.net)

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starring Jason Biggs, Thomas Ian Nicholas, Chris Klein, Tara Reid screenplay by Adam Herz directed by Paul Weitz

American Pie acknowledges a cold, hard fact that most movies don't: it is very difficult to get laid. Its four virgin heroes are Jim (Biggs), a chronic masturbator, Kev (Nicholas), who desperately wants to deflower his girlfriend (Reid), Oz (Klein), a lacrosse player whose approach requires some fine tuning, and Finch (Eddie Kaye Thomas), a germphobe (his crass nickname is hilarious, but I won't spoil it here) who pays a classmate to spread rumours about the size of his member.

Jim, Kev, Oz and Finch attend a high school in suburban Michigan full of so many impossibly beautiful women it's no wonder they're horny all the time. After a party at their studly friend Stifler's (Seann William Scott, in the film's sharpest performance) house leaves them sexually unsatisfied, the quartet make a pact: to "lose it" by graduation-specifically, prom night, which is only a few weeks away.

American Pie is in the tradition of Bachelor Party or Revenge of the Nerds. Almost every conversation these characters have revolves around makin' whoopee. All women are there to be ogled. (Alyson Hannigan's perky music student is the only memorable female of the bunch.) Situations abound that defy logic only to arouse and/or amuse its core audience, adolescent boys. (To arouse: Nadia's (Shannon Elizabeth) Internet striptease-an unexpectedly raucous (and guiltily pleasurable) sequence. To amuse: Jim's lusty encounter with a hot apple pie.)

What differentiates American Pie from those dirty eighties comedies, aside from a very nineties obsession with bodily fluids*, is a cast that's light years more appealing than that of, say, Just One of the Guys. Two more standouts: Klein and "SCTV"'s Eugene Levy. Klein plays a kind-hearted athlete for the second time in a row, after Alexander Payne's underappreciated Election. I hope to see more of this warm actor with the disarmingly honest face very soon. Levy's is the most crowd-pleasing performance, and indeed, it's nice to see him back on the big screen in a role that makes wonderful use of that expressive brow.

American Pie also wants to emulate the teen flicks your parents _would_ let you watch growing up. It skillfully employs a broad mix of pop tunes, much like John Hughes' movies did, and even pays homage to The Breakfast Club a couple of times, most evidently when the prom band covers Simple Minds' "Don't You (Forget About Me)."

The picture ultimately has a healthy, if obligatory, attitude towards safe sex-even at their most libidinous, American Pie's protagonists first whip out a condom. The filmmakers prove that socially responsible raunch is possible.

For its familiarity and for its charming leads, I recommend American Pie, but the buzz on this film had me expecting something...fresher. As far as the New Teen Cinema goes, it's at the top of the heap.

*Don't say I didn't warn you about the party scene.

                                          -July, 1999

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