Adventureland Review

John Campea 39 Comments

Thanks for checking out our Adventureland review.

In the months leading up to the release of Adventureland, I’ve never understood why the marketing machine wasn’t putting a lot more emphasis on the fact that Greg Mottola (also directed Superbad) had written and directed it, or that Twilight superstar Kristen Stewart was one of the primary leads… especially since we’re still in the middle of the massive Twilight hype and that the DVD just came out a little while ago. To be honest, the trailers themselves haven’t looked all that interesting… or funny… so they needed to play on something to get people interested right?

I mean hell… at least play up Ryan Reynolds being in it or something. Because as it stood, you could feel that there weren’t a lot of people interested in seeing this film with the original marketing strategy. As it turns out I was right because on it’s opening weekend Adventureland made an abysmal $6 million dollars. Nice.

So off I go to see Adventureland. Was it as bad as the $6 million results suggest? No… actually it’s a pretty endearing movie… but unfortunately it’s also pretty boring.

THE GENERAL IDEA

The synopsis for Adventureland reads something like this: “Inspired by writer/director Greg Mottola’s own true-life job-from-hell experience, Adventureland stars The Education of Charlie Banks’ Jesse Eisenberg as an uptight recent college graduate who discovers that he’ll have to get a degrading minimum-wage job at a local amusement park instead of spending his summer drinking German beer, visiting world-class museums, and flirting with cute French girls. It’s the summer of 1987, and James Brennan (Eisenberg) has just graduated college. James is all set to embark on his dream tour of Europe when his parents (Wendie Malick and Jack Gilpin) suddenly announce that they won’t be able to subsidize the trip. Now the only things James has to look forward to this summer are sugar-fueled children, belligerent dads, and an endless parade of giant stuffed animals. When James strikes up a relationship with captivating co-worker Em (Kristen Stewart), however, he finally starts to loosen up. Suddenly, the worst summer ever doesn’t seem quite so bad.”

THE GOOD

Although the film is set in 1987, the issues and challenges feel very contemporary. A young man whose dreams have to be put on hold due to financial hardship faced by his family and resorts to working in a job he (and everyone else) deems beneath him in order to save money for graduate school. The film deals with this and the charcters involved in a very real and raw way and was, in my opinion, the strongest element of the film.

I don’t hide that I’m a Ryan Reynolds fan. I’ve become more and more impressed with his acting chops over the years and in Adventureland he’s handed a challenging character to play. The older married guy having affairs with younger women… yet is a “good” guy, a guy you feel bad for instead of angry at for some reason. I don’t think there are a lot of actors who could have effectively pulled this character off as the director intended as well as Reynolds did… delivering what I think is the most interesting and complex character of the movie.

The film has an interesting (not fantastic) sense of nostalgia to it. Those summers we all had, working crappy jobs, speculating about the future, dreaming of escaping the town/situations we were in some day, trying to score with the girls we worked with and counting how many hook ups happened over the summer. The movie does a good job of transporting us back to those times and the feelings and sensations that come along with it.

THE BAD

This is a boring movie. This is also a comedy without many laughs. I think I chuckled twice during the whole movie. The nostalgia is great to have. The social/economic/coming of age issues the film deals with are great to have… but a comedy has to make you laugh and entertain you, and for the most part this movie simply doesn’t deliver… nor does the story have any sense of pace to it. The movie just lingers without any sense of passage of time. Suddenly a character says “we’ve been doing this for a month” and I’m like “What? A month has passed?” because nothing in the narrative itself even remotely suggested it… then they just announce to you that the summer is over. Without this sense of time or pacing, you never get engaged in how the relationship are supposed to be developing or moving forward at all… thus much of the effectiveness of the movie is neutered before it’s even given a chance to conceptualize for the audience.

I’m really starting to hate when a comedy movie keeps going back to the same joke over and over and over and over again. In Adventureland I lost count of how many times they went back to the “punched in the balls” joke. Had to have been at least 5 or 6 times they did the exact same gag. Ha ha ha… yes… I get it… that guy punching the other guy in the balls is supposed to be funny. Can we please move on to something else now?

The whole movie it felt like the lead, Jesse Eisenberg, felt like he was just doing a Michael Cera imitation (who the director worked with in Superbad and I get the feeling he really wanted in this role) and it gets very annoying after a little while… at least for me.

Kristen Stewart did not impress me. Her character, Em, had a lot of potential to it… but her portrayal just felt bland to me and without much soul.

OVERALL

Adventureland is a good movie… that I simply found impossible to enjoy or be entertained by at all. Slow, paceless, boring and worst of all not funny. Some great subjects and nuances are captured in this movie… but it just flat out fails to entertain. I can understand why some other people would like or even love this film… I really can… but for me I just couldn’t wait for the credits to roll so I could leave. Overall I give Adventureland a 4 out of 10.

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39 thoughts on “Adventureland Review”

  1. I found the main character distressingly bland. There were some not so subtle messages embedded (Catholics are bad/intolerant/stupid, alcoholic Dads/clueless Moms abound). I’ve come to expect the repeated opinion conditioning in movies like this, but at least make them funny, or even interesting.

  2. This movie was a serious waste of money on all sides. Do the people making these films screen them? How could anyone short of a stoner appreciate a comedy with no humor? The entire movie was a drug commercial, but I’m not sure how watching those losers would amount to making you think pot improved your life. Ryan Reynolds can be a pretty good actor, so it’s sad that he starred in crap like this and Waiting.

  3. The movie is shit; I have no understanding to why anyone would enjoy this. The director should have known that if u cast a Kristen Stewart, a failure of an actress, you will have a failure of a movie.
    Nonetheless, i hope he learns from this movie’s failure and makes more movies with the same comic genius as Superbad.

  4. The friendship formed between Ryan Reynolds and Jesse Eisenberg is a perfect depiction of schlemiel. Reynolds is portrayed as the cool, suave, “gets all the ladies” guy and Eisenberg is the “joke” against him. For Eisenberg, things just don’t seem to work out, but Reynolds gets to have his cake and eat it too. Physically, Reynolds is a full blown man and Eisenberg is obviously still growing. This is a typical schlemiel relationship.

  7. I thought it was dull.
    A comedy that failed to make u laugh.

    Honestly
    i got way more laughs out of The House Bunny. (which i think is a hilarious movie)

    and it’s john’s opinion, after all this is HIS site.

  8. I agree 100%. I went with a group of 6 friends and I was the only one that was bored most of the time.
    Expectations can be a catalyst when you see films and I was in the mood for a laugh out loud riot, so maybe that is why I didn’t like the movie.

    Is it just me or is anyone else sick of the “quiet/poetic/artistic/ nerd does good” character?

  10. Wow, I just couldn’t disagree with you more. Coming from Greg Motolla, this is such a mature and truly interesting outing as compared to his other noteable film, the mediocre teen comedy that was Superbad. I loved every second of it, minus the scenes featuring Ryan Reynolds. It’s a great film to me, but that’s the brilliance of film. To each their own. Great review!

  13. Ok I liked the movie. I agree the only funny parts were the parts you saw in the preview. I hate it when they do that! But I felt it was an all around good movie. My favorite part is where Em (Kristen Stewart) is in her room and they show the Poison video! I was the only one in the audience that laughed because I was a huge MTV fan when I was a kid. I’m 30 and was there sitting in a theatre with kids half my age. But the outfits they picked for the movie was fabulous! It really brought me back

  15. I freaken loved this movie. The trailer was halarious. Just because it wasn’t what you were expecting doesnt make it suck.
    Its a great film

  16. I have to admit that this movie was a drag. I thought it was pretty well made, and I didn’t mind that the jokes were more natural and less flamboyant, but the relationship in this movie is a drag. I couldn’t relate to it, because I simply can’t relate to the way too serious and lifeless love story in the film.

    I honestly don’t see how the main characters could not scare away any of those girls in this film. He does not know how to handle women whatsoever. There’s nothing wrong with being the nice guy, as long as you don’t try way too hard to be the nice guy and this guy tries too hard and it’s almost embarrassing to watch.

    Maybe it’s because everybody is stoned in the movie, but most of the character don’t seem to have life in them. They look they are dying because they are bored, not even when they are having fun do they look like they are having fun.

    Kristen Stewart is cute, but she looks bored in everything she does, and it’s always like she’s two steps from cutting her wrists.

    Bill Hader and Ryan Reynolds totally stole the movie.

  17. Glad to read that Reynolds did well, looove him. I do want to see this movie but my local theater isn’t getting it. Another DVD wait I guess.

    I hope I enjoy the movie when I see it though

  18. I thought the movie would definitely be more comedy than drama, but I wasn’t disappointed in the least, in fact, I ended up liking the movie more than I thought I would originally. Kristen Stewart is so much better in the hands of a director who will actually director her and she didn’t bug the crap out of me like she normally does, I hope she can learn to relax a little on screen because there is talent beneath the shaggy mop of hair she is perpetually pushing out of her face.

  19. I’ve got to disagree with a lot of your comments in the review.

    First off, should you even mention the box office in a review of a film? (“Was it as bad as the $6 million results suggest?”) Shouldn’t a review be about the quality of the film, rather than how much money it made?

    Plus that is the biggest opening of a Miramax film in years, bigger than NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN or DOUBT. Are they bad films because they had a smaller box office opening weekend?

    Also, have you see Mottola’s THE DAYTRIPPERS? That is the film you should be comparing it to, a film he wrote and directed. On SUPERBAD, he was essentially a hired hand. Most probably thought either Seth Rogen or Judd Apatow directed it.

    If you were going in expecting a wacky comedy, you are sure to be disappointed as that isn’t what it was. DAZED AND CONFUSED is a better comparison.

    Also, how can you write “This is a boring movie.” and then go on to write “Adventureland is a good movie”? If you were bored by it, it lost you. You shouldn’t think it was a good movie.

    For me, I wasn’t bored at all by the film.

    And I didn’t think of Michael Cera while watching Eisenberg’s performance.

    1. Hey Moviezzz

      I wasn’t suggesting that box office results are a reflection on the QUALITY of a movie… but rather on the interest it generated. No one was interested in seeing this movie. My whole context was talking about how surprised I was they didn’t take a different approach with the marketing of the movie.

      Also… I NEVER compared this movie to Superbad at all. Not sure where you got that from.

      And yes, it is possible to recognize the positive qualities of a film… but not have it work for you. There are good things about Adentureland that I recognize… but even though they’re there, it failed to really coalesce for me in a meaningful way. I’m big enough to acknowledge good things about a movie I disliked… and vice versa.

      I’m totally glad you liked it… but for me it just failed in its noble attempt.

  20. “Not all of us can be sheep I guess.”

    either your sarcasm is amazing our your just completely anal about people commenting on your thoughts……..no problem there it is just that well, hmmm, that was kinda rude. Oh well

    Not all of us can be sheep I guess.

    ps i seen this movie and a 4 is so fucking low…you got to be kidding me man….guess if its not what u would have done then its crap?

    1. Hey BigSampson,

      I’m not a sheep in the sense that just because other critics say they like it, I should say I like it. I didn’t.

      You said:

      guess if its not what u would have done then its crap?

      So, can I say the same thing to you the next time you don’t like a movie? Sorry that I didn’t agree with you, but that doesn’t mean that I didn’t like it “just because it’s not what I would have done”. That was a pretty ignorant remark dude.

  22. Eisenberg was on the movie scene well before Cera. So if anything, Cera does an Eisenberg impression. Though other than both being sort of intellectual, but shy, awkward teenagers, I don’t see a correlation.

    Giving this 4 stars and F&F 6 stars is why I find myself always coming back this site. I like to just shake my head in bewilderment sometimes.

    1. Not all of us can be sheep I guess.

      The bottom line was… as much as it pains me to admit it… F&F was a lot more entertaining. Flat out… Period.

      But like I said in my review, I can totally see why some would like or even love this movie, but it just bored me to tears.

    2. Sheep are the ones who helped get F&F $70 mil at the box office (of which, admittedly I was one).

      I laughed a lot during Adventureland and found it to be very similar to Dazed and Confused actually. But the drama in AL had deeper meaning and the comedy was sillier. To each his own, but the last thing I was during this screening was bored.

    3. Hey Andrew,

      I’m glad you enjoyed it, and I can understand why you’d enjoy it. Like I said in my review I could see some of the better qualities of the film… but for me they never came together, nor did any of the attempted humor work (oh look… the sixth punched in the balls joke).

      I wouldn’t call people who went to see F&F “sheep”. They want to be entertained… and the movie presented itself as entertaining… so people went. But I’m never going to say I enjoyed a movie if I didn’t just because a majority of the other movie pundits say they like it.

  23. just saw this yesterday, and it was not as funny as i thought that it was going to be. but overall i felt that it was an okay movie. it was a little boring/slow moving in some parts, there were a few laugh-out-loud moments here and there. but i also saw it before noon at amc so it cost me six-bucks, no way i would spend twelve dollars on this movie.

  29. I thought the movie was pretty decent. It had it’s issues, and I think that the big reason most people would enjoy it is due to the nostalgia present throughout it. Almost everyone will be able to watch this and think back to those days of working a shitty job and realize that that shitty job was actually quite a bit of fun. Yes, it wasn’t as funny as I thought it would be. But then again, I don’t quite think that they set out to make Superbad 2.

  30. wow indeede, at the moment this holds an 89% on rotten tomatoes

    lol, what if john was giving out bad reviews to good movies to give TMB some attention hehe

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