Here's
another review that will most likely get me in trouble with the film's
biggest fans, as Animal House is generally considered
to be a comedy classic among many circles. I've seen it a few
times now, trying to find the nonstop hilarity that many others claim
to be in there, and with every repeated viewing, I seem to like it
even less. Chalk this one up on the films I don't "get", as I
find it to be a scattershot comedy without much going for it save a
very likeable cast of actors and an irreverent attitude that is
sometimes infectious.
The setting is the
fictitious Faber College, where there are many fraternities, but none
as reviled as the Delta house, which recruits almost every loser and
lowlife the other fraternities turn away. They are constantly
threatened to be put out of existence by the college's Dean Wormer,
who seems to be on a mission to make them suffer for all of the
mischievous pranks they pull. Wormer goes into cahoots with the
preppy fraternity, the Omegas, into seeing that the Deltas eventually
fail, losing their fraternity status and perhaps even have all of its
members expelled. The Deltas may sometimes be down, but never
for the count, as they continue their hedonistic ways in complete
defiance to conformity.
Animal House
would go on to inspire many other filmmakers to try their hand at
lowbrow comedies with high energy, and it also set the blueprint for
other fraternity films in the years to come (PCU
and
Old School
are virtual retreads of the Animal House formula).
It did earn itself a massive following of fans, especially of those
who are in college or thinking about going, showing every student's
ultimate fantasy of partying every day, getting laid, and going on
constant road trips getting into trouble. What the producers of
this film almost never show is someone studying or having to go to
class, or any of the many things that make college life the doldrums
in reality. The Deltas are the pinnacle of living for the
moment, and this hedonistic attitude definitely struck a major nerve
in the very hedonistic post-Vietnam, disco and coke era of the late
1970s.
While there
are some inspired gags to be found, stemming mostly from exaggerated
examples of true experiences the writers of the film had when they
were going to college, it is really in the non-scripted moments where
animal House gains most of its laughs. One big
reason comes from the manic performance by John Belushi (The
Blues Brothers), the beer-guzzling imp that every school
administrator despises, but that every student wishes he could be
like, giving the finger to everything that the school, and society in
general, considers holy.
However, even
with the occasionally amusing sight gags, Animal House
isn't really as hilarious as its reputation makes it out to be.
Perhaps there is a tendency among viewers to want to "join in the fun"
and have a good time right along with the Deltas. Certainly, I
would have loved to myself, if only the script could have been more
than a collection of comedic situations that the actors ham up to seem
funnier than they really are. In fact, I found it to be a fairly
boring experience about 70% of the time.
Animal House
is a movie that's more fun to talk about than to actually view.
Perhaps those who partied hard in college or who were in a fraternity
will find this to be the film that defined their early adulthood, and
for that, I can understand its place in your video library. As
for me, I found watching the film to be just like the college years --
one remembers the good times and chooses to forget that most of it was
boring and tedious. Nostalgia often coats over the reality,
whether it is nostalgia for college or for movies, and there's no more
evidence of the nostalgia film that people adore beyond its actual
filmmaking value than Animal House.
-- Followed by a
short-lived television series, "Delta House" in 1979.
Qwipster's rating:
©2005 Vince Leo
