American Pie (1999)

★★★
American Pie came along when I needed it. I've lauded 1999 on this website as my favorite movie year. Personally, though, I was in a bit of a funk that summer. I enjoyed South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut and Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me before this, but they weren't enough. American Pie snapped me out of it. Everything was okay going forward. Jim Levenstein's foibles were more than just easy lowbrow attempts at humor in a high school sex comedy. They were keen observations of a confusing and irrational period of life during which the ability to have second thoughts about one's actions has yet to emerge as a stabilizing force. Jim and his buddies make decisions that teenagers would make and are convinced that their actions are correct, but these decisions originate from a point of view unshaped by real world experience.

Jim (Jason Biggs), Oz (Chris Klein), Kevin (Thomas Ian Nicholas) and Paul (Eddie Kaye Thomas) are luckless seniors who are on the verge of graduating as virgins. There is no shame in this, but peer pressure is a powerful thing, and the boys feel it. As teens, they don't fight it but do the only thing that makes sense to them, which is to acknowledge it and cave to the pressure. They make a pact to lose their virginity before graduating. Even as I sat there in the theater in 1999, I recognized this goal as a superficial one, but to these guys it makes all the sense in the world. What do they do about it? They hatch a number of plans to make it happen with varying results. Sometimes their schemes end in catastrophe (Jim's strip show streamed live). At other times, more effort needs to go into it before any results can be realized (Oz's membership in a choir).

Various other characters enter their orbit. Chuck Sherman (Chris Owen) styles himself as a confident lothario who managed to punch his v-card and subsequently pokes fun at Jim and his friends for falling behind. Steve Stifler (Seann William Scott) is the breakout character. The "Stifmeister" is a raging storm of all things typical of high school movie jocks: hormones, popularity and extroversion. His constant barbs are exceeded only by his drive to throw the best parties. His post-prom party is the final opportunity for the boys to make good on their pact. Kevin's girlfriend Vicki (Tara Reid) is better able to keep any sexual urgings in check, but she also isn't immune to peer pressure and the false expectations regarding sex. She wants sex based on love, which frustrates Kevin, but she also says at one point that she'll go to college and do it with a random guy and will wish she did it with Kevin. No one says she has to do it with a random guy in college either.

The movie's standout sequence involves foreign exchange student Nadia (Shannon Elizabeth). She invites herself over to Jim's house to study history, though she has a naughty side and isn't afraid to show it. Stifler gets the idea to broadcast her on the internet over a private link. Hilarity ensues when these two distinct personalities collide. Nadia sets the stage when she undresses in his room (while he runs down the street to Kevin's house to watch before returning) and enjoys his collection of magazines. Jim is in perfect position to be the first of the group to fulfill his part of the pact, but his bumbling nature and inability to control his bodily processes serve as his undoing. This climax falls entirely within his established pattern of luck. I stand in staunch disagreement against commentators and writers who emphasize her lack of consent to being filmed. That's not the point. Does everyone who likes Ocean's Eleven approve of theft?

American Pie has a clear idea of who these characters are and what drives them and presents their story in a comedy that delivers the goods. The plot bounces from one boy to the other as they each get in and out of embarrassing predicaments. There's a running joke with Paul and rumors about him that all appear to be true. His plan is to toughen up his image, though his plan runs afoul of the Stifmeister, who gets revenge in a form that is sinister and hilarious at once. Oz might have a good thing going with fellow choir member Heather (Mena Suvari). Their courtship is the sweetest and most authentic one in the movie. His challenge is whether to place his priority on choir or his lacrosse team, which has a big game coming up. Their stories intersect at the prom, where the pact threatens to come apart. Jim finally realizes the "bullshit pressure" and is exhausted by the whole ordeal.

Like I said, I needed to see this. If this had been just a routine sex comedy, it would not have had the therapeutic effect on me to get me through that rough summer. I appreciate the antics presented in 1982's Porky's and the contrast it revealed between idealistic 1950s sitcoms and the edgier side of the decade (writer Bob Clark didn't write his script in a vacuum), but that did not set the bar high for this genre. Instead, American Pie writer Adam Herz exaggerated the insecurities of horny high school students ("they probably have special dorms for people like us") while injecting them with enough unique personality quirks to distinguish them from their cinematic forebearers in Virgin High and The Last American Virgin. Jim, Kevin, Oz and Paul are nice guys, even if they do fall prey to bad decisions and short-sightedness.

Most importantly, the movie is very funny. It isn't funny because it thinks sex is funny. It's funny because, among other reasons, the pact leads the boys down different paths instead of a singular path with identical outcomes. They come away from their post-prom party with different perspectives. Will Kevin and Vicki stay together? Is there any chemistry between Jim and his spontaneous prom date Michelle (Alyson Hannigan), a band geek who carries herself with immense positivity? How much did Stifler destroy Paul's momentum? Director Paul Weitz orchestrates these numerous subplots with precision and brings them together during the prom scene and party to give the movie an opportunity to land its final jokes and execute a proper sendoff before the credits roll. Watching this was exhilarating. I remember the initial gasp followed by shocked silence from the crowd when Michelle revealed another use for her flute. I later rented it from Hollywood Video, which was giving out free apple pies as part of a promotion. I asked if this was an interactive movie. The clerk had probably heard that one before.

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