Only Ordinarily Bad

Rating: 3/10 (22 November 2019)

I panned "Superbad" in my review of "Booksmart" (2019), a movie that's essentially a gender-reversed, politically-correct updating of this teen party flick--not that there's much novelty in a coming-of-age comedy of drinking and sex played to pop music and full of gross-out and otherwise juvenile humor. Anyways, I don't like to dismiss movies I haven't seen in years, so I reviewed "Superbad," and it's just as bad as I remember. Unfortunately, it's only ordinary bad, rather than super such, whereby one would've been afforded more laughter at its expense instead of the unreliable intended gags. Why, then, the picture begins by cribbing its title and opening-titles sequence from the blaxploitation film "Foxy Brown" (1974) is beyond me. What does that have to do with this generic piece on sex-crazed, middle-class white kids plus, seemingly more obtusely, two white cops. Bafflingly stupid.
Sure, I chuckled here or there at a few of the other stupid jokes, but most of them are duds. I couldn't care less whether the friendships are mended in the end, or whether the boys hook up with their dream girls--not only because the conclusions are obvious--but also because it's a thin veneer of a plot put onto a picture that follows the chaotic rhythm of partying. And, this is where "Superbad" is especially, well, bad. Looking back at this, there's a considerable amount of dead space; it isn't propelled forward by the soundtrack in the way "Booksmart" is, or as with, say, another Michael Cera-starring party picture, "Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist" (2008). "Booksmart" also benefits from some creative filmmaking, including drug-induced fantasy sequences and underwater photography. Other than Jonah Hill considering a few possible scenarios if he tries to steal liquor in one scene, there's nothing here that's not pedestrian. The camera views and cutting are entirely straightforward. To cite another film that "Superbad" references obliviously, the "Citizen Kane" (1941) of sex comedies, this isn't.