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Superbad (2007)

Director: Greg Mottola

Time Out rating

Average user rating

58 reviews

Synopsis

A coming-of-age tale about two socially inept teenage boys about to graduate high school. Theirs is a ridiculously dependent friendship – but now, they've gotten into different colleges and are forced to contemplate life apart. Evan is sweet, smart, and generally terrified. Seth is foul-mouthed, volatile, and all-consumed with the opposite sex. This is the story of their misguided attempts to approach the objects of their affections in one panic-driven night.

Movie review

From Time Out London

After sex (‘The 40 Year Old Virgin’) and pregnancy (‘Knocked Up’), the new crowned kings of comedy – the broad, improvisatory ensemble of comics and filmmakers headed by Judd Apatow – turn to adolescence. ‘Superbad’ stars Michael Cera and Jonah Hill (the tubby one from ‘Knocked Up’) as two high school seniors preoccupied with alcohol, virginity, parties and the transition to college. Hardly an unprecedented set-up – ‘Dazed and Confused’ and ‘American Pie’ come most quickly to mind – but, like its stablemates, the picture is delivered with unusually high levels of both belly laughs and emotional affect. Gross-out is exploited – and how – but shaded with, and put to the service of, self-awareness, fellow-feeling and regret.

The film is produced by Apatow, co-written by ‘Knocked Up’ lead Seth Rogen and directed by Greg Mottola, whose TV work has included ‘Undeclared’ with Apatow and ‘Arrested Development’ with Cera. Working their pre-existing personae, Hill and Cera make a charmingly geeky odd couple, though third stooge Christopher Mintz-Plasse threatens to steal the movie as the über-nerd who falls in with a pair of puerile cops (including Rogen in a handlebar moustache) by dint of a preposterous fake ID identifying him simply as ‘McLovin’.

If these scenes set themselves a lower bar than the unassumingly deft character work of the main story, with its lively attention to adolescent anxieties, ‘Superbad’ at its best goes right through knockabout to land in deliciously obscene places – notably a staggering succession of doodles in which tumescent cocks take on various extraordinary guises. Crafted with such deliriously pain-staking care as to defy offence, they stand for a film, a group of films, defining the difference between vulgarity and crassness.

Author: Ben Walters 2007-09-10 17:15:56

Time Out London Issue 1934: September 12-18 2007

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User reviews of this film

Person said...

Posted on Sep 27 2007 06:55 AWSOME WORTH SEEING

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person said...

Posted on Sep 26 2007 16:45 borat is a weird film.

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jordan said...

Posted on Sep 25 2007 21:42 Really great film, hadnt laughted so much in a cinema 4 ages! enjoyed it so much going to watch it again this week!

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mel said...

Posted on Sep 24 2007 20:00 one of the funniest films i have seen in ages..my sides were achin with laughin so much! it was just non stop..totally hilarious

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luke said...

Posted on Sep 24 2007 18:52 wasnt very good in my opinion not really worth seeing but gave me good time with girlfriend cus wasnt watching it

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luke said...

Posted on Sep 24 2007 18:51 this film wasnt very good at all not worth seeing in my opinion

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Lazzerini said...

Posted on Sep 24 2007 17:26 Good Lord. This has to have been one of the worst films I have ever had the misfortune to see. A script peppered liberally with profanities and little else does not a good film make. However, the cops were fairly funny, did laugh a bit at the line "I'm going to assume you all have guns and crack".

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stacey...Ox said...

Posted on Sep 23 2007 13:03 god...tbhi fink every1 needs 2 take a moment to chill out...its a film..every 1 has different taste...sum have a very ticklish sence ov humour...sum people have none...not ur choise ov film..? Dont watch it agen den ...simple...xx

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ellen said...

Posted on Sep 23 2007 11:34 Ok, lots of people are saying its shit, but i just think its good if its YOUR thing, Ok so you've seen the adverts yeah? well dont see it if you dident find the adverts funny. The crowd was in hysterics. Its emmbarssing and shocking, thats what the whole POINT in it was. If you dont like movies like Borat and 40 year old virgen, dont go see the fucking film! easy as that! And Joe, what about scotland? It wasent only showed in England you know..

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mike said...

Posted on Sep 23 2007 08:59 YOU'LL LOVE IT OR HATE IT, SO YOU GOTTA TRY IT COZ IF YOU LOVE IT YOU WON'T STOP LAUGHING!

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Boris said...

Posted on Sep 21 2007 22:53 Poor, at the very best. Only 4 people laughed out loud in the cinema and I'm sure none of their balls had dropped. Standards, standards, standards...

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Jon said...

Posted on Sep 21 2007 17:09 Possibly the best film i have ever seen :D

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shannen said...

Posted on Sep 20 2007 18:24 the moviee wazzzzz gddd x

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Erasmus said...

Posted on Sep 20 2007 16:29 Easily the worst film that I have EVER seen ! ! !
A coming of age film it definitely isn't.
If you are foul mouthed somewhat retarded and still preoccupied with sex in the way that you were when you were about ten (or amybe less) then you will like this film,
Only good thing about it was that I had the best sleep that I have had for years and missed the worst bits (according to my companions, who had apparently been under the impression that I was watching it until they heard me snoring).
Can't rate it as the scale doesn't include minus marks.
RUBBISH

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Lyn said...

Posted on Sep 20 2007 11:12 This film was the biggest load of trash I have had the misfortune to see. It was vulgar and not in the least bit funny. I think the board responsible for rating this movie have got it wrong it should be an 18, actually it should have been totally rejected as being unsuitable for British cinemas. How may I ask does Time Out London give it 4 stars??

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