A Nutshell Review: Superbad

Rating: 9/10 (17 October 2007)

Superbad is Supergood!
Many have been lauding high accolades on this teen comedy to be the best thing since American Pie, and guess what, it's true! Before you roll your eyes at yet another teenage and/or sex comedy, with desperate nerds hatching diabolical plans to get laid, Superbad comes across as a breath of fresh air really, given that it has a cast of unknowns, thus free of any expectations to deliver, which thankfully it does.
What it doesn't have in raunchy sex scenes, it more than makes up for with its trash talking, especially from loud mouthed Seth (Jonah Hill), who has possibly the best lines in the movie, though coming close to a scene stealer is Christopher Mintz-Plasse's Foggell aka McLovin with his uber-nerdish demeanour. Together with Evan (Michael Cera), the trio play best friends who, being nerds, have only one another to hang out with, until they get themselves invited to a party only through providing the false hope that they can deliver the booze.
And the trio branches off into two story arcs before converging for the finale, when Seth and Evan left Fogell to fend for himself when the latter goes for the jugular at a booze shop. It's difficult to judge which of the two arcs was funnier, though I'd go for Fogell/McLovin's as it had the inclusion of two zany beat cops played by Bill Hader and Seth Rogen (from Knocked Up), and it has some of the most insane scenes with the antics that these two cops can conjure. Seth and Evan's storyline however centered more on the dramatic aspects of two friends facing the prospect of separation after graduation, and leaned extremely close to homo-eroticism at certain points. But I digress, it did have a definite hilarious scene in a party they gatecrash, which involves, what else, bodily fluids in the most unexpected of manners.
But it's not as vulgar as you think it is, save for gratuitous pictures of the penis in all shapes, sizes, forms, with a limit only the imagination can put a finger (heh) to. It's akin to oral sex - that is, the extremely rapid fire use of the F-word - with attempts at actual horizontal action constantly doused with cold water. The gems are in the dialogue and in both Jonah Hill's and Christopher Mintz-Plasse's fleshing of their characters. To top it off, it actually had quite a coherent story, and an ending which you can read either way, and it'll still work.
Fused with plenty of physical humour, crass dialogue and plenty of rude pictures (stay while the credits roll), Superbad will definitely bring out the guffaws, one way or another. Oh, and watch out for that super-retro opening credits too!