American Wedding

Review by Jason Gaston

Another summer, another sequel, and another trip back to the well. This time, it's the third movie in the American Pie "saga," American Wedding which I am assuming is the last chapter mainly because it leaves all the characters in a nice and sweet spot.

I admit it, I'm a sucker for these movies. I like the raunchy quasi-innocents and I like the characters from the hapless Jim to the helpful Jim's dad, to the far out Finch, and the jackass Stifler. I just love these guys! I could probably watch another three movies with them.

As you've no doubt guessed by now, American Wedding revolves around the wedding of Jim and Michelle, the horny band-dork. While trying to plan the perfect wedding, Jim agonizes about learning to dance, impressing the in-laws, his pubes, and trying to keep Stifler from screwing the whole wedding up with his jackassist tendencies.

Of course, everything that can go wrong eventually does and comic buffoonery commences.

The American Pie movies do what movies like Van Wilder and the countless other sex comedies fail at. These movies make you care about the characters, care about the situations, and care about what happens. Let's face it, there's not a single person in the audience that doesn't want to see Jim and Michelle live happily ever after in the end.

There are three problems I had with this movie. One... Many of the scenes played like you just walked in on a conversation and you spend your time trying to figure out what's going on. Call it sloppy writing or sloppy editing, but it was sloppy something.

Two... The movie is almost too long or, at least, it seems like it's too long. Couldn't we have cut the Stifler dance number that was almost as pointless as The Matrix Reloaded rave orgy?

And three... What the hell was up with Stifler? In the previous two movies, he was a likeable asshole but in this one, he's just an asshole. It's as if the kid has found a new level of assholism. Yeah, he redeems himself at the end, but he just seemed out of character throughout most of the movie.

Still, and despite a major reduction in the characters including Chris Kline (but who really needs him after Rollerball?), American Wedding works. It's still got that charm and that perverted innocent quality to it all while still making you laugh at immature poopie and pee-pee jokes. That, and this is a sweet movie without being deathly saccharine. It's not a great movie, but it's a fun movie.

Save me a piece of cake, fellahs.