Road Trip (Unrated Edition)

Rating:
Summary: Deseves ****1/2 stars
Review: This movie lived up to its hype of ruanch and laughs. Its not on the caliber of Old School or the first American Pie, but it does a damn good job. The dialogue in this was much smarter than some would expect for a gross out comedy.

Rating:
Summary: Flat and Predictable, but Tolerable
Review: The plot of this story is revolves around a college student, Josh Parker(Meyer) who recruits a group of dorm buddies to help him get from New York to Texas in order to intercept a mistakenly mailed video tape of himself having sex with another girl, before it falls into the hands of his girlfriend. On paper, it looks like a winner and I expected to see something like a cross between Vacation and Van Wilder. However, while you might expect this kind of movie to be loaded with side-splitting high jinks, I found the humor highly predictable and the characters flat at best.

There are 3 main characters besides Parker and they are all pretty cliche. First there is E.L. (Scott), as the obnoxious instigator. There is Rubin Carver (Costanzo), as the eccentric pot-smoking A-student. Of course, there is also the pathetic 98-pound straw man virgin Kyle Edwards (Qualls), who is the butt of everyone's jokes. As the plot progresses: the pathetic virgin is deflowered; Carver smokes pot with an old man, and E.L. steals a short-bus and discovers the joys of prostate stimulation. Like I said, it sounds good on paper, but every gag is telegraphed from a mile away.

On the upside, while the humor is flat, the plot is kind of engaging. The main reason that you will keep watching this movie is to find out whather or not Josh gets to Texas in time to intercept the videotape. You will appreciate the consistency and linearity of the storyline, which is not diluted by the inclusion of too many subplots. It really is a good road movie, if not a good comedy.

On the downside (except for Scott and Smart) the actors in this flick have about as much screen presence as a rock. While the characters might have been written as one-dimensional stereotypes, at least they could have played thier roles with some enthusiasm.

Still, Road Trip is a fairly engaging movie but only because of the main plot. As a comedy, however, it is pretty flat.