Accepted

Every comedy set in the world of college must, by law, rip off certain scenes from Animal House. So I don't fault Accepted for having a generally not funny and tedious final 20 minutes in which the main characters must defend their wacky, sophomoric hijinks in front of a deeply serious panel of crusty old Ivory Tower elitists. It's the law, after all.

I still say someone needs to come blow the lid off the campus comedy genre. There are some hilarious comedies of this style - Old School, Back to School, even PCU - but they're all so stale and predictable at this point, so obviously trying for that old Bluto Blutarsky magic. Accepted is a worthwhile addition to the format, notable because there are so few mainstream comedies coming out of studios that actually work in any way, shape or form. If I could afford higher standards, I'd probably dismiss the film as fluff, but I'll take what I can get.



Here's something that kind of pisses me off. I'm trying to write big, broad, mainstream comedy scripts not unlike Accepted. But when I turn in a script, every little detail has to be figured out. No logical inconsistancies are ever permitted. In my last script before the one I'm currently engaged in revising, I had a car trip from West Hollywood to Manhattan Beach take about 20 minutes. I was told it would be more like 45 and that this would never fly. I also had a character agree to a rather bizarre living situation in order to kickstart my plot and was similarly told that this was way too outlandish and needed to be better explained.

Yet here we have a movie that's not only totally ludicrous from minute one, but blatantly inconsistant. Bartleby Gaines (Justin Long) is presented as kind of a Ferris Bueller figure. An expert liar and a quick thinker, he seems to have high school pretty much all figured out. That doesn't include, unfortunately, the college admissions process. So while his best friend Schrader (Jonah Hill) eagerly awaits his arrival at Harmon College, Bartleby must figure out a way to avoid his father's disappointed wrath.

The whole first act is sloppy. Bartleby's not only smart but clever. If he really didn't get in to any schools, we sense he'd still figure out a way to make it on his own for a semester before applying again. And what kind of parents totally ignore the issue of college until their child graduates high school, then randomly remember to ask what school he or she will be attending one night over dinner?

Anyway, that's just my personal beef about having to write scripts on spec, which is much more exacting in this way than just being well-known and connected already and churning something out. The point is, despite these logistical flaws, Accepted actually works pretty well. It's funny in kind of a sly way. Focusing on character-based comedy and witty dialogue rather than outrageous schtick, impressions, pop culture references or farce means that Steve Pink's directorial debut doesn't come off as desperate for laughs like a lot of other recent comedies.

There are some dopey jokes, sure, but not a lot of really obvious, easy ones. (This may be the first college comedy ever without a single beer joke.)

Bartleby's plan, which involves renting out a mental hospital and revamping it as a de facto college, probably wouldn't work, but Adam Cooper, Bill College and Mark Perez's script makes it just plausible enough to get through 85 minutes. The South Harmon Institute of Technology (S.H.I.T.) starts out as an excuse to get out of the house and play PlayStation, but turns into a community of charming rejects who unite to...well, get out of the house, play PlayStation and skateboard. Oh, and check out hot girls in bikinis.

What I really liked about the set-up was that it gave the characters money to fool around with. (Because students show up at their fictional school with tuition checks, they can actually afford to renovate the building and buy lots of video games and pool toys.) It makes the payoff in the second half much more satisfyting. These kids had a million dollars to play around with. They could have just blown it like everyone expects, but instead they use it try and learn something and better themselves. That's actually kind of an uplifting message for a teen comedy.

Another master stroke was casting Lewis Black as the school's nominal "dean," an ex-academic with a fiery temper and an expertly-tuned bullshit detector. Black's monologues and rants, most of which would have fit in perfectly on "The Daily Show," are some of the highlights of the film.

Finally, the script cleverly cuts back and forth between Bartleby's impromptu experiment in education and his friend Schrader's humiliation at the hands of Harmon's most villainous fratboys. Evil preppy frat boys are the villains in pretty much every college comedy and the ones here in Accepted are totally anonymous and generic. But Hill's a pretty talented comic presence (he'll be seen next in the 40 Year Old Virgin follow-up Knocked Up) and he milks these scenes for all they are worth. (He's the guy in the hot dog suit in the commercial instructing you to question him about his weiner.)

I liked Accepted way more than I expected. It's an above average comedy than never quite rises to the level of hilarity. I doubt I'd ever watch it again, but hey, it kicks the ass of Nacho Libre up and down the block.