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American Pie (film)
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American Pie is a 1999 teen comedy film directed by Paul Weitz and Chris Weitz, and written by Adam Herz. It was the first film to be directed by the Weitz brothers, and the first film in the American Pie series. The film was a box-office hit and spawned two direct sequels: American Pie 2 (2001) and American Wedding (2003).
The film concentrates on four boys who make a pact to lose their virginity before their high school graduation. The title of the film refers to a scene in the film in which the lead character is caught masturbating with a pie after previously being told that third base feels "like warm apple pie".
The film ranked 49th on Bravo's "100 Funniest Movies" list, and ranked 22nd on Entertainment Weekly's list of the .
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Encyclopedia
American Pie is a 1999 teen comedy film directed by Paul Weitz and Chris Weitz, and written by Adam Herz. It was the first film to be directed by the Weitz brothers, and the first film in the American Pie series. The film was a box-office hit and spawned two direct sequels: American Pie 2 (2001) and American Wedding (2003).
The film concentrates on four boys who make a pact to lose their virginity before their high school graduation. The title of the film refers to a scene in the film in which the lead character is caught masturbating with a pie after previously being told that third base feels "like warm apple pie".
The film ranked 49th on Bravo's "100 Funniest Movies" list, and ranked 22nd on Entertainment Weekly's list of the . In 2000, readers of Total Film magazine voted American Pie the 6th greatest comedy film of all time and in 2006 viewers of Channel 4 in the UK voted it 7th in a list of the 50 Greatest Comedy Films.
Since the conclusion of the American Pie trilogy, featuring the courtship and marriage of the characters Jim Levenstein and Michelle Flaherty, the American Pie name has gone on to be used as an entity similar to the National Lampoon film series. American Pie has spawned three spin-off films: American Pie Presents: Band Camp - which was a direct to video release from 2005 - and American Pie Presents: The Naked Mile - which was released on DVD in December 2006. The latest film, American Pie Presents: Beta House, was released in 2007.
Plot
Four Michigan high school seniors make a pact to lose their virginity before their high school graduation after a geeky classmate, Chuck Sherman (Chris Owen) claims to have done so at a party at fellow classmate Steve Stifler's (Seann William Scott) house.
Kevin Myers (Thomas Ian Nicholas), the initiator of the pact, tries to repair his relationship with his girlfriend Vicky (Tara Reid) after they have a serious fight at the party when she accuses him of being with her only for sex. Chris 'Oz' Ostreicher (Chris Klein), who is on the high school lacrosse team with Stifler, joins the jazz choir to pick up girls, as the girls in the band know little of his insensitive jock reputation. Paul Finch (Eddie Kaye Thomas), the mochaccino-drinking sophisticate, pays Vicky's friend Jessica (Natasha Lyonne) $200 to spread rumors around the school of his sexual prowess, hoping that it will increase his chances of success.
Jim Levenstein (Jason Biggs) pursues Nadia (Shannon Elizabeth), an exchange student from (former) Czechoslovakia. After she comes to Jim's house to study with him, she has to change clothes after her ballet practice, so Stifler convinces Jim to set up a webcam so they can watch her change. Jim quickly heads over to Kevin's house to watch with him. Once he gets there Nadia is seen on the computer discovering his pornography collection hidden in his dresser, and instead of being offended, she begins looking through it while masturbating.
Kevin urges Jim to go back home, saying this is his best opportunity to lose his virginity. Jim arrives and Nadia orders him to strip. Meanwhile, it becomes apparent that he had incorrectly addressed the email with the webcam link to Kevin and Stifler, having instead sent the link to every mailbox in the school directory; virtually the entire student body are watching.
As Jim slowly caresses her leg up to her genitals, he climaxes prematurely. As Nadia is about to leave, he convinces her to stay, but upon seeing her nude and touching her pubic area, he climaxes prematurely again, humiliating himself in front of the entire student body. In his desperation, Jim asks band geek Michelle Flaherty (Alyson Hannigan) to the senior prom as she is apparently the only girl at his school who did not see what happened.
Finch, meanwhile, has his own problems. Stifler, angry that a girl turned him down for the prom because she was waiting for Finch to ask her, puts a laxative into Finch's mochaccino. Finch, being paranoid about the lack of cleanliness in the school restrooms, and unable to go home to use the toilet as he usually does, is tricked by Stifler to use the girls' restroom. Afterward, he emerges before all the other students at school, humiliated and is left dateless.
At the prom, everything seems hopeless for the four boys until Vicky asks the girl that Chuck Sherman claimed to have bedded about her "first time." She proclaims to everyone at the prom that she and Sherman did not have sex at Stifler's party, leaving Sherman embarrassed and making him wet himself. The revelation takes the pressure off of Jim, Kevin, Oz and Finch, and they head to the post-prom party with new hope.
At the after-party at Stifler's house, all four boys fulfil their pledge. Kevin and Vicky have made up and have sex in an upstairs bedroom, but the act is very awkward. Vicky breaks up with Kevin afterwards on the grounds that they will drift apart when they go to college, with him attending the University of Michigan and her at Cornell University.
Oz confesses the pact to Heather (Mena Suvari), a girl from the jazz choir, and renounces it, saying that just by them being together makes him a winner. They fall in love, begin a relationship, and end up making love on the porch, though the reformed Oz never admits that they did.
Finch strays downstairs to the basement recreation room where he meets Stifler's mother (Jennifer Coolidge). She is aroused by his maturity, and they have sex on the pool table. Stifler finds them together in the morning and faints.
Jim and Michelle have sex after he finds out that she saw the "Nadia Incident" after all. She accepted his offer to be his date because of it, knowing he was a "sure thing," but she makes him wear two condoms to combat his earlier "problem" with Nadia. Jim is surprised by Michelle's unexpectedly aggressive behavior in bed. In the morning he wakes up to find her gone - she used him for a one-night stand, which Jim thinks is "cool."
The morning after the prom Jim, Kevin, Oz, and Finch eat breakfast at their favorite restaurant where they toast to "the next step."
Characters
- Jim Levenstein (Jason Biggs) - The main character of the film, a geeky, sexually frustrated guy who finds communicating with girls incredibly difficult.
- Chris "Oz" Ostreicher (Chris Klein) - Oz is a stereotypical jock, who is eventually softened.
- Kevin Myers (Thomas Ian Nicholas) - The creator of the pact involving Jim, Oz, and Finch. It is Kevin's older brother Tom (played in an uncredited role by Casey Affleck) who gives him the "Sex Bible," and suggests that the group go to the lake house in American Pie 2.
- Vicky Lathum (Tara Reid) - Kevin's girlfriend, who will not let Kevin have sex with her unless everything is perfect.
- Steve Stifler (Seann William Scott) - Refers to himself as the "Stiffmeister." He is frequently the victim of "gross-out" moments, most commonly the unintentional consumption of some bodily secretion (semen in American Pie, urine in American Pie 2, and dog feces in American Wedding).
- Paul Finch (Eddie Kaye Thomas) - An intelligent sophisticate, referred to as "shit-break" by Steve Stifler because of his inability to defecate in school bathrooms.
- Heather (Mena Suvari) - A sweet and innocent choir girl who eventually falls in love with Oz.
- Jessica (Natasha Lyonne) - Vicky's sexually experienced friend.
- Noah Levenstein (Jim's Dad) (Eugene Levy) - Jim's apparently geeky father, whose awkward efforts to help Jim often cause more embarrassment than anything, despite his good intentions. He is the only character to appear in all six American Pie films.
- Michelle Flaherty (Alyson Hannigan) An eccentric nerd who has many annoying stories about her experiences at band camp (a running gag within the film).
- Chuck Sherman (Chris Owen) - (also known as The Sherminator) is a nerdy kid whose (secretly false) revelation that he's lost his virginity prompt Jim, Oz, Kevin and Finch to make their pact. The nickname "Sherminator" comes from his sole attempt at a pick-up line, an awkward joke based on the film The Terminator.
- Nadia (Shannon Elizabeth) - A tall sexy girl from (former) Czechoslovakia.
- Jeanine Stifler (Jennifer Coolidge) - Stifler's gorgeous mother, who is coveted by every boy in the school, often referred to as a MILF.
Location
Much of the film is based on the writer's days at East Grand Rapids High School in East Grand Rapids, Michigan, an upper-middle class suburb of Grand Rapids, Michigan.
In the film, the town is called "East Great Falls," and the high school sports the same school colors — blue and yellow — along with a similar mascot — the Trailblazers instead of the Pioneers. The restaurant hangout, Dog Years, is based on Yesterdog, a popular hotdog restaurant in the nearby Eastown neighborhood of Grand Rapids. The "Central Chicks" and "Central" Lacrosse team that East Great Falls plays against is an amalgam of nearby Forest Hills Central High School and Grand Rapids Central High School.
The movie was actually filmed in Southern California, most notably in Long Beach using Robert A. Millikan High School (of the Long Beach Unified School District) in exterior shots and Long Beach Polytechnic High School in interior shots, whose school colors are also blue and yellow, or gold (in the same neighborhood where Ferris Bueller's Day Off and Donnie Darko were filmed).
Cameos
- Blink-182 made a cameo appearance as the band watching Jim and Nadia during their webcast. Travis Barker, the drummer, was incorrectly credited as Scott Raynor, the previous drummer for the band. Also when their song "Mutt" was credited, they misspelled his name as "Travis Barkor."
- Christina Milian appears as one of the band geeks.
- Casey Affleck plays Tom Myers, Kevin's elder brother.
Soundtrack listing
- Third Eye Blind - "New Girl"
- Tonic - "You Wanted More"
- Blink-182 - "Mutt"
- Sugar Ray - "Glory"
- Super TransAtlantic - "Super down"
- Dishwalla - "Find Your Way Back Home"
- Bic Runga - "Good Morning Baby"
- Shades Apart - "Stranger by the Day"
- Bachelor Number One - "Summertime"
- Goldfinger - "Vintage Queen"
- Bic Runga - "Sway"
- Loose Nuts - "Wishen"
- The Atomic Fireballs - "Man with the Hex"
Although they were featured in the movie, The Ventures' "Walk, Don't Run", Third Eye Blind's "Semi-Charmed Life", Oleander's "I Walk Alone", Hole's "Celebrity Skin", Everclear's "Everything to Everyone" and Harvey Danger's "Flagpole Sitta" were not included on the soundtrack.
The song "Following A Star" by Duke Daniels plays during the montage in which the characters prepare for their prom but is also not included on the soundtrack.
During Finch's conversation with Stifler's mother, the song "Mrs. Robinson" by Simon & Garfunkel is heard in direct reference to the film The Graduate but it, too, was not included in the soundtrack.
Also omitted, is "Anomaly (Calling Your Name)", by BT (under the pseudonym Libra Presents Taylor) which backs Jim's infamous web-cam striptease scene .
Also omitted is one of the last songs played — Barenaked Ladies' "One Week", which is also played during the first party at Stifler's house. A brief clip of "At Last" by Etta James; also not included in the soundtrack, is heard when Jim is walking over to Nadia at Stifler's party.
In pop culture
The film popularized the term MILF (Mother I'd Like to Fuck). The phrase is first uttered by actor John Cho in a scene in which 2 guys are looking at a picture of Stifler's mom, who Paul Finch later has sex with. The phrase is now common in pornography featuring women in their 40's and higher.
On the Family Guy episode "The Fat Guy Strangler", Peter makes a reference to the movie, saying: "Hey pie, I saw you in that movie, you don't deserve to have sex with me, instead i'm gonna eat the whore out of you!"
Jason Biggs appears in the film Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back (2001) as himself, in which he is referred to as "the guy who fucked the pie."
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