American Reunion

I'm really not sure what I thought of this movie. Parts of it were really funny and others were just too stupid to even make me laugh. I think the people I was sitting by affected my opinion of the movie. On my left was a group of guys a few years (at least) younger than me who laughed at anything and everything, on my right was a guy who must have thought he was the next American Idol trying to "sing" every song that played during the movie, and in front of me was a group of pre-teens who didn't laugh at nearly anything. Probably too "sophisticated" of humor for them to get. Well not sophisticated so much as profane and sexual.

Even with these other viewers around me I think I enjoyed American Reunion. It made me excited for my first high school reunion, to see where everyone is in life and what they've been doing. That being said this movie is truly a reunion. The entire cast from the original appears in one way or another and the script even explains away Oz not being in American Wedding: "I missed your wedding, but there was no way I was missing this." Oftentimes the situations between Jim and his Dad were reversed this time around and are just as awkward as they used to be. 

The acting improved on all accounts. It was just fun to see the whole original group together again. It almost felt like a real high school reunion. Obviously with much stranger and more awkward moments, but all the same it was cool to see. Try as they might, the characters have not changed. They are the same nerds, jocks, and jerks that they were in the original and it is awesome.

In terms of humor, that also didn't change. To some this may be a good thing, but to me it just felt old and stale. I'm not sure how it could have been changed, but having so many crude humor movies come out between the first three and this movie has kind of dulled that type of humor. It also makes writers take characters off the deep end too quickly. Reunion didn't really suffer from that, they all went off at the same time, which made some interesting situations arise.

Either way, if you liked the original you'll enjoy this one if only for the fact that you get to see all the original characters together again. Definitely worth giving it a shot.

7/10