At the Movies with Fatwayne

Let me start off by telling you that I was very disappointed by this offering from Greg Motola who brought us the hilarious Superbad. I anticipated the same kind of humor and wise cracks that I enjoyed from his earlier effort. Instead I got a fairly boring story about a recent college grad and his attempts to find employment while smoking pot and hanging around with vapid airheads and (as if I cared) eventually loosing his virginity. Big deal (or rather nothing in this entire movie was a big deal)!

The movie is set in 1987 just after James Brennan graduates from college with a degree in Renaissance Studies. He has his summer planned to include a trip to Europe prior to attending Columbia University for graduate studies in the fall. His plans are dashed when his father is demoted at work and consequently takes a sizeable pay cut. This leaves James with the unsettling prospect of having to find a summer job. Quickly discovering that he is qualified to do just about nothing, he snags a flunky position at a sleazy amusement park called Adventureland.

The employees of this place are all suffering from problems of one sort or another and this is pretty much why they all end up working at the park. James gradually becomes interested in a fellow employee named Em Lewin (Kristen Stewart of Twilight). She prefers to be at the park rather than home because of her father’s new wife who is now her stepmother. Things are further complicated due to Em’s involvement with an older employee who also just happens to be married. And so we muddle through their mundane lives for the next  hour and a half waiting for something exciting or funny to happen. The trouble is that nothing ever does happen!

Quotes can be found at  http://www.tvmoviequotes.com/adventureland.htm

Rating  – R  -

Fatwayne’s rating  –  -