 | ON: Content is age-appropriate for kids this age. |
 | PAUSE: Know your child; some content may not be right for some kids. |
 | OFF: Not age-appropriate for kids this age. |
 | NOT FOR KIDS: Not appropriate for kids any age. |
Van Wilder: Freshman Year
- Review Date: July 10, 2009
- R
- Genre: Comedy
- 2009
Common Sense Media says
Campus sex-booze-drugs prequel bashes religion, sobriety.
Parents say
QUALITY
Kids say
What parents need to know
Parents need to know that this is a review of the unrated DVD and not the R-rated version from theaters. This youth-baiting sex comedy is centered on "fornication," partying, drugs, and humiliation-revenge as key parts of the college experience. Much female cleavage and toplessness, and even "abstaining" students (the girls, anyway) are practically nymphomaniacs when tempted. Religious types and military (with a few exceptions) are depicted as immoral right-wing hostiles, compared to the freewheeling title dude, whose anything-goes lifestyle is made to look heroic. Profanity is not nonstop but plentiful enough. Seeing other Van Wilder movies isn't necessary for following the, er, intricacies of the narrative.
What's the story?
VAN WILDER: FRESHMAN YEAR is a prequel, obviously to National Lampoon's Van Wilder. Even as he's graduating from high school, preppie top-dog Van Wilder (Jonathan Bennett) is such a sexual champion that while delivering the commencement address he enjoys oral sex under his robes from a girl classmate. The cocky teen, like all the men in his illustrious family, enters Coolidge College, where the wealthy, fun-loving Wilders have played key roles for generations. But the onetime "party school" has unexpectedly gone ultra-conservative, restricting alcohol and drugs and preaching that sex is sinful and forbidden. Stuck in a strict ROTC unit under the command of his father's old enemy, a nasty military colonel, Van Wilder still finds ways to rebel and party.
Is it any good?
You don't really have to have seen the previous Van Wilder and VW: Rise of Taj movies to follow this one, just understand it's a lower-class (in every way) edition of the establishment-undermining bad manners and collegiate milieu of National Lampoon's Animal House. Van Wilder started out as a National Lampoon property, sort of a next-generation-Animal House, but that once-great humor magazine seems to have seen fit to take its name off the property -- a warning sign indeed.
The Christian-bashing is labored, and even the gross-out and body-function stuff isn't terribly creative by 21st-century standards. Timeliest bit: a takeoff on controversial US military “waterboarding” torture tactics with captives. Only here it's beer-boarding, har-har.
What families can talk about
Families can talk about the concept of the "Big Man on Campus" -- not terminology employed here, but the underlying motif of the whole Van Wilder movie series. An American icon going back for generations, the BMOC is the ultra-cool, smooth school-society leader and "fixer" who seems to get away with everything. Compare Van Wilder particularly with the more family-friendly Ferris Bueller's Day Off. Is Van the kind of guy that Ferris will grow up to become?
Ask kids if they enjoy this kind of extreme-sex comedy and why. Do they believe that college is really like this?
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AGE
New Van Wilder isn't any better than the first two
Van Wilder is back as a freshman in college and is the same as ever. This new Van Wilder movie is more or less, exactly the same as the first two Van Wilders. Van Wilder is introduced as a fun loving, young adult who parties without consequence. He meets a girl that he likes, then meets her up-tight boyfriend. Then the movie continues with pranks played by both Van and the jealous boyfriend on each other. Then, the boyfriend pulls a prank that seems to have gotten Van kicked out of school and rid of for good, until the climax where Van humiliates the ex-boyfriend and wins the girl. That's the basic outline of all three Van Wilder movies (with the exception of #2, where Van is replaced by Taj). If you didn't like the first two Van Wilders, then I guarantee, that you won't like this one. This new Van Wilder is no different. If you're a fan of the first two, then it's worth a rental, just to see all the pranks that were passed over by the creators of the first two. Parents should know that this Van Wilder is just as raunchy as the first two. There are bare breasts, bodily-function pranks, sex and sexual references galore, marijuana use, and moderate R-rated language. Van gets a bj during his graduation from high school speech. He sticks vibrators in girls dorm rooms (which they all use) and then tapes vibrators underneath a bench causing a group Christian girls to all have orgasms. A dog has humongous balls. A man thinking he's getting a "happy ending" to a massage, but instead gets a bj from a dog. Van teaches students about sex positions, using clothed, male and female demonstrators. Van walks into a cheerleaders locker room and trims all their shirts and a skirts. Two men are tied together and the one in the back gets an erection, and the list goes on and on. There are about 10 f-words, and a handful of s-words and other swear words. To parents, If you had no problems letting your kids see either of the first two Van Wilders, then this one is fine.
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helpful info I really needed
I’m so happy I stumble upon this blog! A lot of helpful info I really needed to know these stuff, I had a hard time with those foreign characters. Thank you so much
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Kid, 8 years old
August 10, 2011
AGE
NOT FOR KIDS
not for kids at all im seaven and i do not think my mom should have let me watch it like 19 and up not for kids but pretty funny but its pg 13 pretty bad movie
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| Studio: | Paramount Pictures |
| Director: | Harvey Glazer |
| Cast: | Jerry Shea, Jonathan Bennett, Kristin Cavallari |
| Genre: | Comedy |
| Run time: | 100 minutes |
| Theatrical release date: | July 11, 2009 |
| DVD release date: | July 14, 2009 |
| MPAA rating: | R |
| MPAA explanation: | pervasive crude and sexual content, language and drug use. |
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