"Musical" genre under attack.....

Rating: 2/10 (19 May 2015)

PP2 is not quite as bad as the original flick, at least they refrained from "vomit humor" this time. Still relying on teen/college raunchy comedy, mostly based on character stereotypes. Rebel Wilson is still doing "Fat Girls Are Funny" material, far below the standards currently being set by Melissa McCarthy, a comedic genius who just happens to be, um, a Large Girl. Brittany Snow is still doing her Naïve Blonde from the "American Dreams" TV series (but at least she wises up to reality by the end of the show and actually Dares To Graduate...). And, they've added two more stereotypes to the mix: the black lesbian chick and the Hispanic/Latino immigrant. The vast majority of the laugh-lines are based on these stereotypes. As for it being a "musical," that is a misnomer. Musicals feature original music written for the show, including songs the characters sing instead of doing dialog as the story moves along. This is a movie about music groups, so there are scenes with music, but it's always the groups rehearsing or doing their competitions. None of the characters are seen singing their way through a scene, as in "Into the Woods," except when the Fat Girl is singing to her boy friend as she rows across a pond in a canoe. But the scene isn't about her singing, it's about the "tension" in the audience, waiting to see if she does a Fat Girl Pratfall into the pond. The movie's "comedy" is capped by a scene near the end, featuring physical/slapstick material, starring.....the Fat Girl, of course. All the music in this flick is re-hashed and re-mixed, which is what the choirs do for their competitions. Real musicals generate hit records that get added to radio station airplay lists. PP uses music that's already been on the hit charts, and now we're hearing it done up in A Capella style. No way does the PP franchise meet the standards set by such masterworks as South Pacific, Sound of Music, Oklahoma, or the Music Man.