Everyone remembers what it was like to be a high school student—for some, this experience came to an end only last year, and, for others, it has been awhile since they walked the taunting hallways. Regardless of what generation, each person has faced the difficult scenarios of attempting to manage courses and graduate while trying to fit in with the popular crowd and get that special someone to notice. High school may have been the best years for some, but everyone has lived through at least one traumatic event. Superbad, written by Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg and loosely based on their own lives, captures the essence of the awkward years and what high school was like for the nerdy crowd.
The main focus lies on the life-long friendship between Seth (Jonah Hill) and Evan (Michael Cera), who are just trying to graduate while facing the fact that they will be going to different colleges. Determined to make the best out of their last few weeks of high school, Seth and Evan make it their mission to finally “hook up” with their dream girls—who happen to be the perfect, beautiful sweethearts and unlikely to give them the time of day. However, these two pals see their window of opportunity open up when Jules (Emma Stone), Seth’s love interest, amusingly is paired with him for a Home Economics class. She invites the boys to a party she is having that night and they begin to set plans into motion.
Often stealing the screen in this nonstop laughfest is the frequently-dissed and highly geeky Fogell (Christopher Mintz-Plasse), who some may have seen in the previews as McLovin. Fogell visits the place for fake IDs, and after settling on a Hawaiin residence, picks the name of McLovin—it was either that or Muhammad, he explains. When Seth and Evan learn of Fogell’s plan to get a fake ID, Seth tries to play it cool by mentioning that he’s the one with the fake to impress Jules. Unfortunately, this backfires a bit when the boys are charged with the mission of buying and supplying the booze for the entire party, with the money Jules’ vacationing parents left her for food for the week.
Although there are hilarious scenes placed throughout the entire film, some of the funniest interactions and lines come about when Seth and Evan see the McLovin ID and panic that they will get busted. Fogell finally gets up the nerve to enter a liquor store, and after managing to convince the clerk that he is, in fact, McLovin, gets sucker-punched by a robber, prompting a call to the police. Seth and Evan return from around the corner to see a cop car outside with its lights on and come to the conclusion that Fogell was busted and is getting arrested. Seth refuses to take the fall with Fogell—he believes that by buying Jules the alcohol and getting her drunk, she will sleep with him and possibly be his girlfriend for the summer.
When he tries to take off, however, Seth is hit by a car backing up, which is just the beginning of his bad luck. Desperate for money and/or booze for the party, Seth cons the driver into taking them to a party where they plan to walk off with some liquor bottles. Meanwhile, inside the liquor store, the two officers—Officer Slater (Bill Hader) and Officer Michaels (Rogen)—are trying to collect a statement from Fogell, who they seem to believe is 25-year-old Hawaiian McLovin. The officers offer to bring McLovin home, but their evening turns into a night of drunken debauchery and police breaking their own laws—which kept the entire audience in stitches for the middle stint of the film. At one point, the three of them are drinking beer on the side of the road and shooting at stop signs, even though they have an angry bar patron they arrested in the back of the cruiser. They give McLovin the time of his life by trying to prove that even cops can have fun.
After being dragged to a party and now fearing they will get beat up, Seth and Evan go to all lengths to either get booze or face the music by showing up to the party empty-handed. Evan is set on telling Becca (Martha MacIsaac) how he feels and how he has felt all along with hopes she will respect his honesty and like him in return. After filling laundry detergent jugs with beer, they set off down the road—only to be hilariously reunited with Fogell. Eventually they all make it to the party and save the day with all the booze, and then it is time for the guys to get their ladies drunk and make a move. You will just have to go see the movie to know whether they got lucky or not.
For a movie that will keep you roaring with laughter from start to finish, I highly recommend spending the $10 on a ticket to Superbad. Everyone will recognize some of their high school selves in these characters, and the awkward situations and commentary that follow only add to the silly nature. Make no mistake, though—this movie is riddled with vulgar and sexual language, so if you don’t appreciate those remarks, you may not be able to sit through the whole film. Overall, Superbad was the perfect end-of-the-summer film, and if you liked Knocked Up (from the same production group), then your sides will definitely ache in this one.
