MOVIE REVIEW

American Wedding  (2003)

Starring: Jason Biggs, Alyson Hannigan, Seann William Scott, Eugene Levy, January Jones, Eddie Kaye Thomas
Director: Jesse Dylan

Rating: R

Studio: Universal

Release Date: 8.01.03

Review Posted: 8.14.03

Spoilers: None

By Christopher T. Bryan

"American Wedding" A Tiresome Force of Habit

Bear with me for a moment; American Pie was like grandma’s apple pie, made by hand with lots of love, warm, inviting and loved by all who partook of it. Then it was stored in the fridge for awhile and reheated. At which point it was still quite tasty but not nearly as filling. The third nuking, American Wedding, begins to taste of freezer burn.

Enough with the metaphors. American Wedding is the unnecessary final slice in the American Pie trilogy. It re-teams approximately half the original cast for Jim (Jason Biggs) and Michelle’s (Alyson Hannigan) wedding. Weddings offer a lot of prime opportunities for crazy things to happen. There’s the planning, cake, flowers, personal hygiene, distant relatives, random homosexuals and of course the bachelor party planned by none other than Stifler (Sean William Scott). Unfortunately for the guys in the audience, eye candy in the form of Tara Reid, Mena Suvari and Shannon Elizabeth is notably missing, and the ladies will have to do without Chris Klein. Is this really a spectacular loss? In many ways the answer is yes.

American Pie has always been billed as a gross-out teen movie with heart. For me the heart came from the cast; and with half the cast missing so was half of what made American Pie a sweet movie. The remaining cast members are so familiar with their characters that they have turned them into caricatures of what they once were, taking actions and situations a few steps past funny and into the realm of annoying. 

Anything mimicked as much as American Pie is bound to get tiresome and so is the case here. Too often there is a been-there done-that feeling about certain scenes which leads the audience to laugh more out of habit than out of genuine appreciation of a humorous situation. Basically every plot point in the movie is nothing more than a set-up for what is supposed to be another disgusting and utterly uncomfortable moment aimed at getting laughs. A little more story would have gone a long way.

With that being said it is fun to see many of the actors reprising their roles. Biggs is still as naive as ever and his scenes with Eugene Levy are priceless. In some ways Sean William Scott saves this movie, in others he slaughters it. American Pie simply wouldn’t be American Pie without Stifler, but Scott doesn’t seem to take this role seriously anymore (honestly, who could), he walks through the role being as silly as possible almost to a condescending degree. Alyson Hannigan’s character who stole the show with her trademark “what’s my name bitch?” is too domesticated in this third installment when we just want to watch her make Biggs her bitch again and again. I’m not sure what the purpose of Thomas Ian Nicholas’ character was here other than to have another returning member of the original cast. Eddie Kaye Thomas is back as Finch; however this time around it seems as though sleeping with Stifler’s mom is more of an obligation than a tantric experience.

American Wedding offers some laugh-out-loud moments, but with each successive film they become fewer and farther between. Even so, the third helping of pie is more enjoyable and still more original than many of this summer’s offerings.

Rating: êê   (out of 4)

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