Notes on…

American Pie(1999)

Dir. Directed by Paul Weitz

I likely haven't seen this film in about 20 years, but it now reads as a rather gutless rewarming of the 1980s teen comedies by the likes of John Hughes etc. The soundtrack is especially poor in comparison to those classics, and American Pie's uninspired (and weirdly quiet) music somehow communicates something of the insipid nature of the film's approach, to say nothing of the obviously added fart noises and so on. Unfunny even on its own chauvinistic terms, you don't even get much sense that the film is even enjoying itself in its gross-out, épater la bourgeoisie 'jokes' within its atmosphere of misogyny and homophobia, just going through the motions for the most part. Indeed, so that the couple of performances and characters that do stick out (Natasha Lyonne's Jessica and Mena Suvari's Heather) actually feel 'off'. And my God, all their prom suits look terrible.


[T]here is an extra layer of darkness to Pie’s central erotic metaphor. The national reference in the film’s title positions the white male as America’s default subject, and its suggestive elision between pastry and female genitalia hints that women’s bodies are the piece of American pie to which every white male is entitled.

Chelsea Davis (LA Revew of Books)

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Synopsis: At a high-school party, four friends find that losing their collective virginity isn't as easy as they had thought. But they still believe that they need to do so before college. To motivate themselves, they enter a pact to all "score" by their senior prom.