Van Wilder: Animal Party

What this movie has and other movies lack are characters you admire and care about. The movie never succumbs to sentimentality, thankfully, and it keeps a high level of cheerfulness and humor through the entire running time. This is a movie that wants to party and have fun, where characters are in high spirits and at times a little inebriated. This is the movie that will put the National Lampoon franchise back into respectability. Not only is this movie gut-bustingly funny – if you can get past the crude visual puns like a pit-bull with what looks like a ten-pound scrotum attachment, and a crotch-enhancer pump that is mistaken for a bong – this transcendent comedy of gross manners is most affecting because it's incredibly well-made. Most college campus comedies are cheap in production value and clumsily structured. Van Wilder is exceedingly well-paced and smartly written, by writers Brent Goldberg and David T. Wagner (their love for Ferris Bueller is apparent) who know how to set up not only a joke but sequences of offhand slapstick that are irrepressibly absurd. Director Walter Becker (creator of the ingenious short-film Saving Ryan's Privates) handles the irreverent and random acts of background physical comedy with ease and panache.

The campus wild man is fittingly known as Van Wilder (played by Ryan Reynolds). Van Wilder is a guy that has friends from everywhere, from the jocks to the nerds. Reynolds finds a precarious balance between recklessness and cheerful insanity, which is crucial because he turns acts of humanitarian philanthropy into casual and spontaneous gestures without giving second thought. No job is ever too big for the man, whether it is becoming the de-facto basketball coach that inspires the school's team to win or setting up a rockin' party for the geekiest fraternity on campus. Van Wilder has enthusiastic support from everyone but his burned-out workaholic father (played by Tim Matheson, once the wild man in National Lampoon's Animal House) who decides after seven years of his son's enrollment to stop tuition payment.

Van Wilder becomes the subject of a school newspaper editorial and Tara Reid plays the snobby, uptight reporter Gwen whose ties belong to frat boy Richard Bagg (Daniel Cosgrove), who conducts hazing rituals that are crueler than anything since Animal House. When Gwen tries to get the naked truth from Van Wilder, she mostly just finds Van Wilder naked. But it's the smart rapport that develops between them that allows Van Wilder to strip Gwen's inhibitions, to let her walk on the wild side. In the background, a turf war erupts between Van Wilder and Richard.

The plotting is shameless in its methods of revenge. There are innocent people involved in the mayhem, including a scene where pre-pubescent boys raid one of Van Wilder's parties and end up barfing out of a school bus (but hey, these young boys had the time of their life until then). Richard's fraternity brothers are sent a basket full of éclairs stuffed with juices from a particular dormitory pet. In a knock-off homage to Dumb and Dumber, a character digests a bottle of colon blow right before he is to take a final exam.

The movie rarely takes a breath. It does settle for easy chuckles but goes for the comic gold, pushing past the ribbon of where comedy usually wears out in exhaust. Not every joke works, but you admire the efforts that the filmmakers went to in order to make you laugh. A virgin's first encounter with a girl that culminates in a massage oil rubdown gets more than messy and squanders too much, thus not earning any laughs. A scene where Van Wilder has to charm a raggedy and prunish administrator gets frighteningly explicit and goes on maybe one shot too many. But Van Wilder is always the man of the moment. One of the dorky characters goes to Van Wilder to ask him how to `muff dive.' Ultimately, Van Wilder is king and his rebel-bent philosophy is trippingly funny. At the end, you won't be able to remember all the funny scenes because there are just too many of them.

I generally hate these teen sex comedies and I approached "Van Wilder" with hesitation, but I actually found it to be quite entertaining and humorous (if you're in the right mood, I suppose).

Ryan Reynolds (doing a great Chevy Chase impersonation) is a guy in his late 20s who has been at college for eight years and still doesn't have a graduation in sight. His father, a rich politician (played by Tim Matheson), finally decides to cut off his son's money and as a result, Van has to think of a way to come up with enough cash to stay in school.

Pretty soon Van becomes a party planner and uses his knowledge on partying to throw great ones for nerds. He makes money off of it and his business soon becomes quite lucrative.

If you like National Lampoon humor, you may like this. If you don't, you probably won't. I gave up on National Lampoon a long time ago but this is one of their better efforts in recent years. Don't get me wrong, it's not a great movie; but I found Reynolds (who seems to pick up a lot of flak) to be quite funny and Matheson and other ex-Lampoon star cameos were amusing.

Recommended for those who can enjoy stupid humor. If you liked "Dumb and Dumber," you'll probably enjoy this.

This was one heck of an hilarious movie. I can watch it over and over. Reynolds did a spectacular job in the movie, but I must say that without the character Taj the movie wouldn't have been as funny.

This is more of a guy comedy type movie but my gf loved it also.

The donuts scene I must say was a little gross but still the movie was amazing. Laughed from start to finish..... This is the kind of guy everyone would like to be or know in College.

I don't think they could of taken anyone else then Reynolds to do this role maybe I m just saying that because he is one of my favorite actors but he did do a great job. 9/10

Most collage movies are over the top dumb, filled with one constant goal, sex, but this movie isn't like most collage comedies. Yes it has sex, drugs and parties, but it's full of fun humor and heartfelt moments. Ryan Reynolds brings his full charm to the camera as his character tries to figure out life and romance in this charming collage comedy.

Van Wilder (Ryan Reynolds) is one of the coolest, nicest, likable and most popular guy at the Coolidge College. He's also has an personal assistant (Kal Penn). Wilder is great at throwing parties and helping students with their courses at their most outrageous moments but since Wilder is at his seventh year as senior and he never takes his future seriously. Graduation for Wilder is the furthest thing is his mind. Things are about to change, when an young attractive reporter (Tara Reid) try to figure out Wilder's wild life. Wilder's father (Tim Matheson) threatens to stop paying his tuition for the seventh time. Wilder, His Personal Assistant and His Buddy (Teck Holmes) will try find ways to keep Wilder in college. But there's a slimly college student (Daniel Cosgrove), who is the boyfriend of the reporter. This jerk will do anything to get Wilder out of college.

Directed by Walt Becker (Buying the Cow, Wild Hogs) made an smoothly surprisingly well done outrageous comedy with a couple of very funny scenes (With also one hilarious gross-out scene is actually disgustingly memorable, if you like it or not). Reynolds' appealing performance makes this college comedy film fun to watch. It is also better than most of these silly college movies and this one offers something fresh. This film was an modest hit at the box office. It was also one of the top selling DVD's of 2002.

This unrated DVD has an clean anamorphic Widescreen (1.85:1) transfer an good-Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound. DVD menus have an censored and uncensored options. The second disc is packed with extras, including:Deleted Scenes, Outtakes, Behind the Scenes featurettes and more. This film is a lot of fun, if you don't think about it too much. Written by the writers of "The Girl Next Door":Brent Goldberg and David T. Wagner. Deon Richmond, Erik Estrada and Chris Owen appears in cameos. Paul Gleason (From "The Breakfest Club" fame), Curtis Armstrong ("Bugger" from "Revenge of the Nerds" films) and Unbilled:Tom Everett Scott appears in small supporting roles. (*** ½/*****).