I suppose there have been many failings in the American Pie sequels, more so in
the straight-to-vid extensions than in the two theatrical sequels. American Pie
4: Band Camp has absolutely nothing to do with the first trilogy, and American
Pie 5: The Naked Mile has absolutely nothing to do with American Pie 4. The
decision to handle the series that way was not a good one on the part of the
suits, for many reasons, the first and foremost being that the first trilogy was so
popular because of our identification with the characters. The next two promptly
dropped that element of instant empathy to introduce two completely new casts
(except for cameos by Eugene Levy).
American Pie 5 was better than American Pie 4 in that regard. Although it did
not connect to its predecessor, it did establish at least a tentative connection
to the characters in the theatrical trilogy. It introduced two new Stifler
cousins, one very much like the original Stifler, the other the ... er ... white
sheep of the family, the shy nice guy who is required in every coming-of-age
comedy. American Pie 6 has the good sense to build on the new Stifler characters
and to bring Levy back as a major character rather than to stick his face in for
a cameo. In essence, American Pie 5 and 6 are the first two parts of a second
trilogy, while American Pie 4 is stranded on its own, with no connection either
to its predecessors or its successors.
I thought that American Pie 5: The Naked Mile was a fairly entertaining movie
because it combined some raunchy antics and nudity with a fairly good little
coming-of-age story that had a tidy and spectacular ending which carried the
romantic formula beyond the quotidian and reached for a bit of icon-building in
the manner of The Graduate or Jerry Maguire. It didn't reach those heights, but
at least it made the effort.
The weakness of American Pie 6 is that the romantic stories (yes, plural - there
are two this time), while sweet enough, aren't interesting at all, and they
basically just end with kisses in the pool. In general, the scriptwriter ran out
of steam at the end, and the film just sort of drifts off into the credits at
some random anticlimactic time. Meh.
The strength of American Pie 6 is the raunch. The nudity comes on the screen
just about non-stop and the bodily fluids never stop being expelled from any and
all orifices. I suppose some people don't consider raunch a positive element,
but if you do like lots of breasts and gross-outs in your comedy, this is
probably the rowdiest, lewdest, grossest film I've seen this year. It's not
all that funny, but it is consistently naughty. There's about as much nudity as
in American Pie 5: The Naked Mile, and there may be even more drunken ribaldry.
And that's a lot.
In the previous film our heroes were high school seniors checking out the
college action. They must have liked it, because this time the same lads are
freshmen in that same college, trying to pledge the legendary Beta House. The
Betas are the party animals, the Delta House for a new century. The Betas have
an enemy who seeks to halt their drunken antics and shut their house down completely. Sound
familiar? No, it's not Dean Wormer. In fact, there is no sign of any faculty or
administration in this college. Their enemy is the kingpin of the snob
fraternity. He's the rich guy in a suit, just as Greg Marmalard was in Animal
House, but since this is the new millennium, the rich boys are all sons of
computer geniuses and dot.com millionaires, so they are all nerds! Life has come
full circle since the seventies, when the college movie nerds were the
underdogs. Now they rule the roost. They even get the hottest chicks.
One disappointment between The Naked Mile (American Pie 5) and Beta House #6) is
that the evil dwarves have been eliminated from the cast. Well, actually they do
make a ... I was going to say a short appearance, but let's just call it a
cameo.
The bitter rivalry between the Beta Frat and the Geek Frat finally comes down to
the Greek Olympics, which they play for each other's charters and domiciles,
kind of a "loser leave town" match. The competitions include: beer drinking;
bra removal; and holding off on ejaculation as long as possible while being
sexually taunted by the girlfriends or ringers provided by the other team.
Another event is a riff on The Deer Hunter, a Russian Roulette game in which the
two participants mimic the characters in the famous Cimino movie, and take the
competition just as seriously as they did in the original. The difference is
that instead of firing bullets into their temples, they are using a squirt gun
with a revolving chamber to fire equine semen down their throats. And there's no
doubt that stallion cum can be tough on the ol' throat. You might say the loser
ends up a bit hoarse.
On that note, I think you probably have the general idea of the film. , so let's
get to the nudity except for
the fat chick "riding the white whale," who is Christine Barger. I should have
been able to identify the sex addict chick, but I couldn't figure it out from
the credits. (Stifler goes to sexaholics anonymous to pick up chicks, but ends
up regretting it. He has to sneak out after fucking her three times, and the
designated house animal has to finish her off when he stumbles in inadvertently.)
American Pie 6 comes to DVD at Christmastime.
