PCU
It's game time, readers! We'll be playing "Name That Flick," in which I call out various film elements, and you tell me which movie I'm describing. Ready? Here goes:
**A fraternity full of academic misfits,
**A crusty college administrator,
**A group of uptight preppies, and
**A plot between the administrator and the preppies to expel the misfits
I expect that most readers would think of Animal House; however, PCU was the intended answer. It's not likely that these two campus comedies are coincidentally similar. In fact, it is safe to say that PCU is a rip-off of Animal House.
Tom Lawrence is a high-school senior who is visiting Port Charles University to decide if he wants to enroll there after graduation. The Admissions department arranges for him to spend the weekend at The Pit, an underground fraternity house. When Tom arrives at PCU, he meets with a few surprises: The campus has developed into some kind of liberal, bleeding-heart, sensitivity-awareness center. The student body is split up into protest groups, none of which get along. Also, Tom's contact, James "Droz" Andrews, did not willingly sign up to be Tom's host; a friend retaliated for a Spring Break prank.
Droz (Jeremy Piven) has problems of his own. His freshman-year roommate, Rand McPherson (David Spade), is setting the Pitsters up to be expelled from PCU. He composes a $7,000-plus house-damage bill to give to the university's president Thompson to pass on to Droz. The Pitsters have three days to pay this bill, or they lose the house. What's their brilliant plan? A party with a door charge, of course! Little do they know that they're playing right into McPherson's hands.
This movie will never rise to the ranks of Animal House and Revenge of the Nerds, because, to reiterate, PCU is fundamentally unoriginal. Also, it's not exactly piss-pants hilarious. The movie has a few chuckles if you're in a good mood. One of PCU's funnier elements is the protesters' caricatures. For example, an environmentalist threatens to drive a nail onto a Pitster after watching him nail a flyer into a tree; she then ironically gives the peace symbol and vocalizes its meaning.
The casting is probably another reason that PCU is nothing more than a forgettable comedy. Jeremy Piven is not a convincing lead actor. He was trying to be Tim Matheson but has none of his charisma. The rest of the cast consists of a bunch of no-names, with the exception of David Spade and Jon Favreau (Swingers). It's been 10 years since PCU was released, and those two guys are the only ones who have climbed over the wall of obscurity. Spade didn't even bring his comic talent as seen on "SNL" and, two years later, Tommy Boy.
Interestingly, all of Port Chester University's protest groups present a microcosm of contemporary American life. It seems that everyone is fighting for a different cause, and any new change that would benefit one group pisses off another one. It's nearly impossible to please all of the people all of the time, but PCU's ending will show how you can piss off nearly everyone in a single minute.
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Droz imparts the following words of wisdom to a prospective incoming student: "Beer is your best friend. Drink plenty of it."
The man-hating feminist characters might spoil a potentially romantic mood.
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