Accepted (PG-13)
Scott:
Scott: Tonight we are reviewing Accepted
a movie about what happens when you allow young minds to roam free.
What’d did you think Mike?
Mike: I couldn’t get in to the movie; my pass wasn’t ‘Accepted’.
Scott: I guess that means that I will go solo on this review.
Justin Long stars as Bartleby Gaines, a graduating high school student more interested in tom-foolery than getting into college. His year of messing around and not doing the required work has finally caught up to him .He is rejected from every school, including ‘State’ – where everyone gets accepted. Bartleby, of course, comes up with the perfect solution, create his own college.
For being such a young actor, I have seen Long in several of his movies. Galaxy Quest, Jeepers Creepersand Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story come immediately to mind. He is also the Apple guy from the recent Apple commercials that I can’t seem to avoid lately. His character in the Apple commercials seems to be the same as in this film – cool and breezy.
With the help of best friend Sherman (Jonah Hill), Gaines creates a brand new college and a super cool website to go along with it - South Harmon Institute of Technology. If you think about the name of the school and what the initials spell out, then you will have the basis for about 30 jokes in the movie. Things don’t go as planned with the new school, but I don’t want to spoil the fun, so I will stop here.
You may not recognize Hill from any of his past work, but he did have a funny role in The 40 Year Old Virgin as the confused eBay Customer. I always laugh at that scene when I see it. He is a BIG reason why this movie is funny. He carries the first half of the film with an incredible amount of funny lines. He has so many good lines that you may miss a joke here or there because you are laughing at the previous joke. Unfortunately, he disappears halfway through the movie and from that point on, the humor dies down too. The scene from the trailer where he is dressed up as a hot dog is not he funniest scene in the movie, so don’t worry about that.
Gaines’ love interest in this movie is relative newcomer Blake Lively. She plays Monica, the normal unreachable high school beauty. I have never seen her in anything, but my wife recognized her from The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. In this movie, she really reminded me of Kate Hudson. She has a very infectious smile that lights up the scenes she is in, just like Hudson. I hope to see her in more movies to really find out if she is a good actress, or a one shot star.
Adam Herschman as Glen, Columbus Short as Hands and Maria Thayer as Rory round out the rest of the inaugural ‘class’ of the new school. Each character is good for a few laughs, but none stand out.
There are several site gags in the movie, and more of the goofy stuff you would expect to find in a movie like this. What you won’t expect, but will find, is some really funny jokes. I expected this to be a normal juvenile ‘high-school nerd makes good’ movie, but it is surprisingly good. I laughed hard and frequently, as did the rest of the viewing audience. At some points, as I mentioned earlier, the jokes came so fast that you would laugh through follow up jokes.
My favorite concept from the movie is the ‘What do you want to learn?’ board. It appears throughout the movie and if you can catch a solid glimpse of it you will get a laugh. With classes like ‘Ole Dancing for Beginners’ and ‘Wingman-ing 101’ it’s no wonder the school is popular. Sadly, I have not been able to find a full list of the classes available on the board in the movie.
What did I think?
I wasn’t expecting much, and was surprised at what I got. I liked the film, and I think it’s the best of its kind to come along in a while. It seemed to want to come across as maybe an Animal House lite at times, but thankfully, it didn’t focus too much on that. I give this a 3 overall and a 4 for college-comedy.
