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SLACKERS

This rancid college "comedy" oh-so-subtly establishes its rebel credentials in the opening moments as an orchestral version of the Who’s "Baba O’Riley" ("It’s only teenage wasteland") plays while we’re introduced to — oh, for the love of Salinger — Holden University. It’s on this brain-dead campus that three uninteresting arrogant seniors are blissfully cheating their way to diplomas. That is, until Ethan (Jason Schwartzman), an uninteresting psychotic stalker classmate, stumbles onto their scams and threatens to have them expelled unless they can set him up with his dream girl, Angela (James King).

Everything about this movie is horrible. The characters talk in that pseudo-coolspeak penned by out-of-touch screenwriters; the absurd moments are more uncomfortable than humorous (we see 71-year-old Mamie Van Doren’s much younger breasts); and not one character is the least bit likable —except, of course, the inevitably perfect Angela, who’s beautiful, has a 4.0 GPA, and volunteers at a hospital and a soup kitchen! Comedies about psychos can be funny (The Cable Guy), and Schwartzman himself proved he could handle an unbalanced misfit in Rushmore. But first-time director Dewey "Get the camera away from him" Nicks slacked off on this one.

BY MARK BAZER

Issue Date: January 31 - February 7, 2002
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