Accepted 2006, 89mins, 12 Director: Steve Pink Cast includes: Justin Long, Jonah Hill, Maria Thayer, Lewis Black, Blake Lively
If nothing else Accepted has a great premise. A bunch of slackers fail to get into college and as a result form their own. The picture didn't however hit big with the public, bombing at the box-office and it's not particularly hard to see why. Whilst the film has a good idea and a solid teen cast, Accepted only shows how a tepid script and flaccid direction can undermine the quality of any production. When "B" (Justin Long) fails to get into any college much to the disappointment of his parents, he along with a group of his pals decide to set up their own the South Harmon Institute of Technology (or S.H.I.T....lame alert!!!) in order to make them look better in the eyes of their mothers and fathers. However neighbouring colleges don't like the party all day attidude of S.H.I.T and promptly it's combo of bikini babes, drunken fiestas and general craziness is put under inspection. The performances in Accepted are all fairly adequate, Justin Long is a likable (if a tad bland) in the lead, Jonah Hill is a scene stealer as his brain box best friend and Lewis Black provides a few chuckles as the fake hired Dean for the newly "opened" university. The rest of the characters are within themselves clichés, kooky girl, sports jock, hot chick with feelings and idiot with a talent. We've seen these presentations of youth a thousand times before in Animal House, American Pie, Road Trip and more recently Superbad. Accepted has as good a plot as any of those pictures, but it's constant recycling of their jokes and characters makes it far harder to warm to. The villains are all snooty and aryan, but not one is given a character. Even mediocre teen flicks like Road Trip and Slackers manage to present us with a total bastard of a bad guy, Accepted has nothing... Steve Pink's direction is uninspired and really has nothing unique to it's name. He frequently shows wasted "party dudes" doing outrageous stuff and sexy girls stripping down to skimpy bikinis but that won't satisfy anyone over the age of 16. The script is pretty lame, several gags do work quite well and Jonah Hill has a whole barrage of cheeky one liners but you won't find yourself laughing that often. Even smiles are scarce during the pictures rather short 89 minutes, more often than not your just bored. The idea would have been far better under the careful eyes of the Weitz brothers are Judd Apatow, the creative team here have done well to come up with the idea but in it's actual construction have fired far to many blanks. The PG-13 rating doesn't even allow for a raunchy style of humour, sex jokes are rare and generally juvenile and weak in Accepted. Indeed the only real one I remember is a hot girl who names her special skill as taking her clothes off, thats it.... Fans of the genre may find some stuff to like about the picture, and those to young to legally watch without a guardian might think it "totally awesome". The truth however is very dustant from that, Accepted is dull and if we're being brutally honest deserved the backlash and failure it received. Best to reject this, and try your luck with better institutions like American Pie or Superbad.
If nothing else Accepted has a great premise. A bunch of slackers fail to get into college and as a result form their own. The picture didn't however hit big with the public, bombing at the box-office and it's not particularly hard to see why. Whilst the film has a good idea and a solid teen cast, Accepted only shows how a tepid script and flaccid direction can undermine the quality of any production. When "B" (Justin Long) fails to get into any college much to the disappointment of his parents, he along with a group of his pals decide to set up their own the South Harmon Institute of Technology (or S.H.I.T....lame alert!!!) in order to make them look better in the eyes of their mothers and fathers. However neighbouring colleges don't like the party all day attidude of S.H.I.T and promptly it's combo of bikini babes, drunken fiestas and general craziness is put under inspection. The performances in Accepted are all fairly adequate, Justin Long is a likable (if a tad bland) in the lead, Jonah Hill is a scene stealer as his brain box best friend and Lewis Black provides a few chuckles as the fake hired Dean for the newly "opened" university. The rest of the characters are within themselves clichés, kooky girl, sports jock, hot chick with feelings and idiot with a talent. We've seen these presentations of youth a thousand times before in Animal House, American Pie, Road Trip and more recently Superbad. Accepted has as good a plot as any of those pictures, but it's constant recycling of their jokes and characters makes it far harder to warm to. The villains are all snooty and aryan, but not one is given a character. Even mediocre teen flicks like Road Trip and Slackers manage to present us with a total bastard of a bad guy, Accepted has nothing... Steve Pink's direction is uninspired and really has nothing unique to it's name. He frequently shows wasted "party dudes" doing outrageous stuff and sexy girls stripping down to skimpy bikinis but that won't satisfy anyone over the age of 16. The script is pretty lame, several gags do work quite well and Jonah Hill has a whole barrage of cheeky one liners but you won't find yourself laughing that often. Even smiles are scarce during the pictures rather short 89 minutes, more often than not your just bored. The idea would have been far better under the careful eyes of the Weitz brothers are Judd Apatow, the creative team here have done well to come up with the idea but in it's actual construction have fired far to many blanks. The PG-13 rating doesn't even allow for a raunchy style of humour, sex jokes are rare and generally juvenile and weak in Accepted. Indeed the only real one I remember is a hot girl who names her special skill as taking her clothes off, thats it.... Fans of the genre may find some stuff to like about the picture, and those to young to legally watch without a guardian might think it "totally awesome". The truth however is very dustant from that, Accepted is dull and if we're being brutally honest deserved the backlash and failure it received. Best to reject this, and try your luck with better institutions like American Pie or Superbad.