Hey, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab.
Mr. Beaks is a picky bastard.
So imagine my surprise when he called me after seeing OLD SCHOOL to tell me that it was “flat out hilarious.” And what little he’s told me about the film would seem to back up that initial statement. Between Vince Vaughn and Will Ferrell, Beaks says the film is brutal in its efforts to make you laugh. Well, hell... I’m overexplaining.
Here’s Beaks to tell you himself...
OLD SCHOOL (d. Todd Phillips, w. Scot Armstrong & Todd Phillips)
Todd Phillips’s OLD SCHOOL is a shambles; an unfocused, barely-developed collection of outrageous gags well beyond their expiration date buttressing yet another attempt to recapture the elusive magic of NATIONAL LAMPOON’S ANIMAL HOUSE. Being that it was from the team that served up the fitfully amusing ROAD TRIP, it was reasonable to expect little more than a few guffaws provided by the impressive assemblage of comedic talent. At best, the film seemed an odd mix of demographics (three commercially unproven, thirty-ish actors heading up a raunchy teen sex comedy) headed for a modest box office payoff. Every time I ran across a plot synopsis, I couldn’t help but wonder why the film existed at all.
I got my answer: Phillips and his collaborators obviously understand the secret of ANIMAL HOUSE’s enduring appeal. It’s not a well-tailored script, meticulous direction, or unabashed bad taste, but the infectious charm of its decorum-flouting protagonists, played by Luke Wilson, Will Ferrell and Vince Vaughn. In Landis’s film, the entire house represented a rebellion against the establishment, embodied by Dean Wormer and the WASP-y Omega House, all of whom reeked more than a little of Nixon-era hypocrisy. In OLD SCHOOL, the enemy is maturity – getting married, having kids and going softly into that good-paying, if soul-crushing, job. Our heroes furiously combat this by regressing to the bacchanalian nirvana of their college years, convening an ersatz, semi-underground fraternity in a house near a local campus. This is a great “happy idea”, and it’s been cast to absolute perfection.
The reluctant ringleader of the group is Mitch (Wilson), a bored professional whose relationship with his girlfriend flames out when he flies home early from a business trip to find her engaging in a gang bang. In response, he moves out, acquiring the aforementioned house, the advantages of which are enthusiastically noted by his married friends Beanie (Vaughn) and Frank (Ferrell). To celebrate his freedom, they throw “Mitch-a-palooza”, a wild beer bash (with a special appearance from Snoop Dogg) that cements the guys’ god-like status on campus, but draws the ire of the school’s dean (Jeremy Piven), who just happens to be an old target of torment from the boys’ past. The dean seeks to acquire the house as campus property, so Beanie responds by recruiting students and various members of the community (from beaten down family men like themselves to an octogenarian ex-Naval officer) to join a fraternity. By doing this, Mitch is somehow allowed to keep the house, while the revelry may continue unabated. Oh, and the men now have a support structure from which they can draw strength as they stave off childhood’s end.
It’s a wildly improbable premise, but Phillips and his actors execute with such conviction, you’d have to be a complete crank to not go along with it. I know I was a goner once Vince Vaughn, at his irrepressible best, began openly admonishing Ferrell to bolt the altar as his immediately-to-be bride walks down the aisle with her father. It’s a stock moment from any thousands of men-behaving-badly comedies, but nobody does this kind of good natured scoundrel better than Vaughn. What keeps his performance fresh, however, was the decision to give this rascal a couple of kids. One of the film’s best running gags is Beanie’s habit of saying “earmuffs” – a signal to his kids to cover up their ears while he uses profanity or discusses something entirely inappropriate. Taken with his recent gangbusters work in MADE, it’s a shame we haven’t seen more of Vaughn over the last few years.
Whatever buzz this film has generated has largely centered on Will Ferrell, who has finally cast off his SNL chains and appears ready to become a comedic superstar. As Frank (or “Frank the Tank” for his beer bong expertise), Ferrell is playing a former wild man vainly attempting to domesticate himself through his new marriage; however, his plans run spectacularly aground once Mitch acquires the house, as “The Tank” is reawakened to calamitous effect. Like the other leads, Ferrell’s role is deliberately pitched to his wheelhouse, and he’s constantly finding the right-field bleachers time and again despite the overly familiar situations into which he’s painted. Whether he’s drunkenly (and quite nakedly) rounding up partygoers to “streak through the quad”, or having an inadvertent GRADUATE moment at the bottom of a swimming pool, it’s a credit to Ferrell’s sure timing that these timeworn gags don’t fall flat. And, I’m sorry, but it’s impossible not to giggle uncontrollably at his sincere, if upper-register challenged rendition of “Dust in the Wind”.
Though there are countless flaws strewn throughout OLD SCHOOL, the only one that comes back to bite it in the ass is the lack of a credible villain. Absent a Dean Wormer or Greg Marmalard, Phillips attempts to fill this void with the sneering Jeremy Piven, as valuable a comedic character actor as there is working today, but he doesn’t effectively represent any sort of establishment or ideal, and he doesn’t have a viable foil off of whom he can bounce his corrupt authoritarian schemes. Again, the real enemy of the frat brothers appears to be work and personal responsibility, but since Beanie stays married throughout and no one quits their job, these concepts don’t gain much weight. By the time Piven is threatening to expel those members of the house actually enrolled at the college, the best Phillips can do is to trot a ridiculously comprehensive exam ala BACK TO SCHOOL, which, while offering up a few killer sight gags (Ferrell’s gymnastics floor exercise routine is pretty damn funny), makes for a flat resolution. It’s as if the filmmakers just threw their hands up and said, “well, that’s ninety minutes; we’re outta here!”
The lack of a substantial antagonist is a huge mark against the film, but, again, OLD SCHOOL is so terribly funny for the rest of its running time, it doesn’t end up harming the film too irreparably; the chemistry between the actors, and the sheer ludicrousness of the concept, override it all. Plus, Phillips is clearly wired in to his target audience’s consciousness; ergo, he knows to go for the full “R” rating, which happily isn’t earned exclusively for Ferrell’s frightening full-frontal display. He also makes nice, Lolita-esque use of 24’s Elisha Cuthbert, who, I’m happy to report, is continuing to grow up very nicely (though I must note that Leah Remini from “The King of Queens” goes woefully underused).
The best compliment that can be paid a film like this is that I can’t wait to see it again with friends. Though its unoriginality is pervasive, OLD SCHOOL is a great low-brow blast of juvenilia that’s far more hilarious than could ever be expected. Funny is funny, and this film consistently hits its marks. Quite simply, it’s the most pleasant surprise of my moviegoing year to date.
Faithfully submitted,
