FOUR FUN MOVIES TO WATCH WHILE YOU’RE BORED Nicholas Cervania VOLUNTEER
University is a weird time in your life, especially when you’re first starting out. Oftentimes, it can come across as an awkward transitional period between high school and adult life. However, university can also be a place where you find yourself and your place in the world — and thankfully there are countless movies that explore this idea. During your first year, you might find yourself feeling overwhelmed or stressed. Here are four fun movies you can watch when you want to relax and have a good laugh. These movies center around graduating high school seniors or life in post-secondary — something that most first-years will likely be able to relate to.
SUPERBAD (2007) Superbad was released in 2007, a time that was dominated by the generation of raunchy adult comedies. To be completely frank, most of the movies from this period fail to hold my attention. Most of them have very weak plots and premises and exceptionally bad pacing. However, Superbad is the one movie from this era that I think is the exception.
Superbad centers around life-long friends Evan (Michael Cera) and Seth (Jonah Hill) as they try to procure alcohol for an end-of-theyear high school party. While seeming like a simple raunchy adult comedy, Superbad is a cleverly disguised and compassionate coming-of-age story. The main problem that Evan, Seth and their friend Fogell (Christopher Mintz-Plasse) face throughout the movie is their lack of confidence. Each character’s development is based around them gaining confidence, making the film a lot easier to relate to.
ACCEPTED (2006) What lengths would you go to in order to find a place where you belong? What if you had the opportunity to reshape the outdated school and education system? When Bartleby Gaines (Justin Long) and his friends get rejected from every college they apply to, he decides to create a fraudulent post-secondary institution to fake his acceptance in order to appease his parents with high expectations. After creating a website for his fake school, forging an acceptance letter and repairing an abandoned mental hospital to pose as the campus, Bartleby is ready to waste his college years playing games and goofing off with his friends. However, when it’s discovered that the website is fully functional and accepts enrollment for all who apply, Bartleby’s fake school is suddenly flooded with incoming students. Bartleby decides to let the students think his fake college is real and becomes responsible for managing his unconventional approach to education. Like a lot of students coming into post-secondary after high school, Bartleby and his friends haven’t found their place in the world yet. While Bartleby hasn’t found a college to accept him, his best friend, Sherman Schrader III (Jonah Hill), has, but finds himself an outcast among the fraternity whose family legacy he wishes to carry on. The story of Bartleby and his friends is one about youth finding and creating a place where they belong, a place where they can feel — as the name suggests — accepted. 22 | GAUNTLET FROSH 2021
Seth’s top priority is to “get laid,” but that goal stems from his insecurities and lack of self-confidence. In contrast to Seth, Evan seems to have little to no interest in sex. His main goal is to get closer to the girl he likes, while also making an effort to distance himself from Seth, who he thinks has stopped him from enjoying his time in high school and who he’s leaving behind to go to Dartmouth in the fall. Knowing this, Seth constantly feels betrayed by Evan throughout the events of the film, driving a wedge between them and their friendship. While the two reconcile before the end of the film, they ultimately sacrifice their friendship in order to pursue relationships with the girls they want. In the end, Seth and Evan get what they want, but they lose the only thing that they had, making for a bittersweet ending.
Superbad is a story about two friends learning that despite having an unqualified companionship with one another, they ultimately can’t avoid drifting apart as they grow older. It’s a hilarious and timeless coming-of-age story and one of the quintessential films of this generation.
