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Review #220 of 365
Film: Accepted [PG-13] 90 minutes
WIP™ Scale: $12.50
Where Viewed: Metropolitan Metrolux 14, Loveland, CO
When 1st Seen: 19 August 2006
Time: 9:15 p.m.
Soundtrack: Download the soundtrack from 
now – or - order the CD below
Review Dedicated to: Steve S. of Cooper City, FL
Click for 'Review Lite' [a 150-word or less review of this film]
Believe it or not a few years ago a little National Lampoon® film known as Van Wilder starring Ryan Reynolds virtually changed my life. I saw the film in a suburb of Chicago with my sister. Neither of us were that excited to see the film, however, it fit our timing needs that day. Now, mind you, this is a Nation Lampoon® film known for hi-jinx, gross out scenes, and scripts that appeal more to college-aged males than other viewers. On the way home from the theatre, I realized something very important. I had become Van Wilder. If you strip away all the gross stuff in the film and get down to the essence which is really about a guy who has become wildly popular in his niche which is as the go to guy for anything you need done on his college campus yet has become so comfortable that (a) he never wants to leave a.k.a. graduate and (b) he's no longer growing as a person. Well, that was me in the job I had in the school I was at. I was no longer growing. I was having a brilliant time and loving every minute of it, but I was stagnating as a person. So, I did something really quite brave for myself at the time and applied for other jobs with more responsibility that would cause me to need to change and grow. The reaction of those around was me was striking. Many people thought I was crazy. "Why would you ever want to leave this?" "It's so safe." "Your future is secure." "Don't you like it here?" Well I had a lot of doubts myself. And, I started to wonder if I was really capable of doing anything else. But, I had to try. And, guess what, yep, I got another position. It was excruciating leaving my comfort zone, but it was an essential step in the progression of my future. So, I owe that to Van Wilder.
Now the reason I have shared this sort of personal story is two fold. First, I think it is very possible to bury a brilliant, important, and powerful message deep in a film surrounded with stuff, such as embedding long john donuts with unmentionable filling etc., that's unnecessary and gross. Please do not ask me to contemplate why Hollywood writers, directors, and producers feel this type of thing is necessary. It was during the time when each successive film pitched at teenage males had to outdo the next in gross out scenes. Still, I feel it is very important to be able to look past that and move on to the core. Maybe you don't give the film 5 stars but you certainly don't need to give it 2 stars or 1 star. Punish a film by admonishing the need to do this kind of thing that really doesn't add to the plot, but don't overlook the elegance of the message the overall film conveys just because some marketing person said it was necessary in order to make the film popular with the right demographic group. The worst thing about it is that if the movie is a success, those demographers feel they are right; when, in fact, they don't know that at all because they didn't release two versions of the film to see which would do better. They draw the wrong conclusion and perpetuate what might well be a myth. Maybe Van Wilder would have done just as well or maybe even better without the gross out scenes. Maybe giant new demographics for the film would have opened up because a lot of people don't like these needless gross out scenes, perhaps more than do! The second reason I bring this up, and I do apologize for taking so long to get to the review for today's film Accepted, is that Accepted shares a lot in common with Van Wilder though, perhaps, with far greater societal impact—it doesn't always have to be about me. They overlap in that they both have deeply important philosophical messages to deliver, but these are embedded in a story that has some savory, gross, inappropriate stuff going on around it. It's important to recognize the good in this film and try to overlook the other stuff. Like I said, admonish it, but don't dismiss the entire movie because of it.
Now the reason I have shared this sort of personal story is two fold. First, I think it is very possible to bury a brilliant, important, and powerful message deep in a film surrounded with stuff, such as embedding long john donuts with unmentionable filling etc., that's unnecessary and gross. Please do not ask me to contemplate why Hollywood writers, directors, and producers feel this type of thing is necessary. It was during the time when each successive film pitched at teenage males had to outdo the next in gross out scenes. Still, I feel it is very important to be able to look past that and move on to the core. Maybe you don't give the film 5 stars but you certainly don't need to give it 2 stars or 1 star. Punish a film by admonishing the need to do this kind of thing that really doesn't add to the plot, but don't overlook the elegance of the message the overall film conveys just because some marketing person said it was necessary in order to make the film popular with the right demographic group. The worst thing about it is that if the movie is a success, those demographers feel they are right; when, in fact, they don't know that at all because they didn't release two versions of the film to see which would do better. They draw the wrong conclusion and perpetuate what might well be a myth. Maybe Van Wilder would have done just as well or maybe even better without the gross out scenes. Maybe giant new demographics for the film would have opened up because a lot of people don't like these needless gross out scenes, perhaps more than do! The second reason I bring this up, and I do apologize for taking so long to get to the review for today's film Accepted, is that Accepted shares a lot in common with Van Wilder though, perhaps, with far greater societal impact—it doesn't always have to be about me. They overlap in that they both have deeply important philosophical messages to deliver, but these are embedded in a story that has some savory, gross, inappropriate stuff going on around it. It's important to recognize the good in this film and try to overlook the other stuff. Like I said, admonish it, but don't dismiss the entire movie because of it.
"…a film with a palpable message wrapped in a film that should not be dismissed as teenage summer drivel. "
As I see it, the film directed by Steve Pink and starring the "I'm a Mac" kid / Vince Vaughn protégé, Justin Long, as Bartleby Gaines, delivers us the story of how a kid who gets rejected from every single college to which he applies, tries to pull the wool over the eyes of his parents by creating a fake college and inadvertently ends up creating a wild new model for collegiate education especially for those very non-traditional learners who tend to flounder in traditional colleges. Bartleby's idea, at first, is to have his best friend, Sherman Schrader (Jonah "Click" Hill) create a mock web-site for a school that will, yes, unfortunately for the acronym, be called South Harmon Institute of Technology. To his credit, B. doesn't realize the acronym until it's too late. He sends himself a fake acceptance letter to relieve the disappointment of his parents who cannot comprehend how he has not gotten in to a single college. The idea, however, gets out of hand when his parents want to see the school. He co-opts his friends including Sherman (now accepted into Harmon College) and two others, Hands (Columbus Short) and Rory (Maria "Strangers with Candy" Thayer) who were also denied admission at the colleges of their choices, into helping him convert an abandoned mental hospital into a make shift college. For funds, they use the $10,000 that B.'s father gives him to give to the college for his fall semester of college. All they have to do is make the public areas look real and find someone to play the role of the college's Dean.
Drop off day, however, also presents a problem, fortunately, Rory solves this by getting her bi-lingual education class to come and pretend to be students arriving at the school. All goes well, and the quartet believes they have everything in the bag until the absolutely most unexpected thing happens. Apparently, Sherman made the website so good and so functional in order that it would completely impress Bartleby's father, that over 300 students have applied and been accepted by the computer into the school. And, guess what, they all show up for orientation. This leaves Bartleby again with the need to scramble and figure out what to do. Sherman is deathly afraid that participating in fraud will jeopardize his admission to Harmon while Rory and Hands go with the flow. Making matters worse, the dean of the real Harmon College Dean Van Horne (Anthony Heald) has his sights set firmly on the land which South Harmon Institute is occupying, and he sends his stooge, Student Community Service Committee Chair Hoyt Ambrose (Travis "Transformers" Van Winkle) to get the lease holder to give up the property. Turns out that Hoyt's girlfriend long has been the object of Bartleby's secret obsession, and Hoyt the college boy who's been occupying her attention.
So, Bartleby decides it's best to cut and run until he holds a meeting with the entire student body and find that they all really need this. For some, it's the first time they’ve ever been accepted into anything. A trip to Harmon College convinces him that they can create a college that will serve the students better than a traditional college and the kids will learn more and become more productive and happy members of society. He does this by allowing each student to focus completely on learning all about the thing that interests him or her the most. So, Rory really wants to learn as much about meditation and relaxation as she can, so she does. Hands wants to be a wood carver, so he becomes one. And so it was for the other students. Eventually, though, Dean Van Horne via Hoyt Ambrose learns the truth about South Harmon and vows to shut it down so he can take the land.
Along the way, there are some needlessly gross parts. There is a lot of underage alcohol consumption. There is a sense that the kids are doing nothing but partying. The writers could have strengthened this part of the film by having the kids learn things that were a bit more compelling than aerodynamics of skate board half pipes and how to blow things up with one's mind. In any case, the importance and great relevance of the film comes in the embedded philosophical statements. At the end of the film, Bartleby is called before the State of Ohio Board of Education to justify the accreditation of South Harmon, and the speech he gives is palpable and powerful. He reminds that the key to education and fulfillment of the promise schools make to students should be to ignite their passion for learning and empowering them to become the thing they've always dreamed to become not place infinite road blocks in their path, stifle their creativity and curiosity, and force them to conform to traditions and rituals of antiquated class structures producing workers that go out in to the world ill-prepared to actually make a living and, more importantly, contribute in a significant way that brings them joy to society. The film reminded me again of my desire to become and actor or a director and how schools throughout my lifetime did everything they could to discourage this path in favor of preparing for medical school. "Do you know how hard it is to make a living as an actor or a director?" They would always say. As if it's easy to make a living as a physician. So, again, for me, the film provoked some powerful thoughts about the industry of higher education in the USA. And, make no mistake, it is an industry. These institutions are in the business of making money and loads of it. Think about it, Bartleby's little college brought in $10,000 x 300 students. That's $3,000,000. Studies show that people with a college education earn more than those without. Is that because of the education they received or because employers use a piece of paper with a college's name on it as a factor in whom they hire? Again, false conclusions from statistics can be drawn. I in fact, know countless people that are in professions that have little or nothing to do with their college major. Do you need a chemistry major to run a bank? In the end, Accepted really worked as a film because it shows the passion of one kid to do something important in his life and create something that fulfills the dreams and expectations of so many others. To me, Bartleby Gaines is a role model. My hope would be that colleges and universities this nation over would take a page from the South Harmon Institute of Technology curriculum white board and realize they owe it to their students not to just make money off them, not just to pretend they have some lofty educational mission statement they are fulfilling because they say they are fulfilling it, but to actually create environments where shear will and imagination collide to produce graduates capable of enriching the world with their unique gifts and creations rather than slotting into pre-fab jobs, in pre-fab buildings, living in pre-fab apartments, with their pre-fab partners, contributing pre-fab comments to pre-fab conversations about a pre-fab world.
Along the way, there are some needlessly gross parts. There is a lot of underage alcohol consumption. There is a sense that the kids are doing nothing but partying. The writers could have strengthened this part of the film by having the kids learn things that were a bit more compelling than aerodynamics of skate board half pipes and how to blow things up with one's mind. In any case, the importance and great relevance of the film comes in the embedded philosophical statements. At the end of the film, Bartleby is called before the State of Ohio Board of Education to justify the accreditation of South Harmon, and the speech he gives is palpable and powerful. He reminds that the key to education and fulfillment of the promise schools make to students should be to ignite their passion for learning and empowering them to become the thing they've always dreamed to become not place infinite road blocks in their path, stifle their creativity and curiosity, and force them to conform to traditions and rituals of antiquated class structures producing workers that go out in to the world ill-prepared to actually make a living and, more importantly, contribute in a significant way that brings them joy to society. The film reminded me again of my desire to become and actor or a director and how schools throughout my lifetime did everything they could to discourage this path in favor of preparing for medical school. "Do you know how hard it is to make a living as an actor or a director?" They would always say. As if it's easy to make a living as a physician. So, again, for me, the film provoked some powerful thoughts about the industry of higher education in the USA. And, make no mistake, it is an industry. These institutions are in the business of making money and loads of it. Think about it, Bartleby's little college brought in $10,000 x 300 students. That's $3,000,000. Studies show that people with a college education earn more than those without. Is that because of the education they received or because employers use a piece of paper with a college's name on it as a factor in whom they hire? Again, false conclusions from statistics can be drawn. I in fact, know countless people that are in professions that have little or nothing to do with their college major. Do you need a chemistry major to run a bank? In the end, Accepted really worked as a film because it shows the passion of one kid to do something important in his life and create something that fulfills the dreams and expectations of so many others. To me, Bartleby Gaines is a role model. My hope would be that colleges and universities this nation over would take a page from the South Harmon Institute of Technology curriculum white board and realize they owe it to their students not to just make money off them, not just to pretend they have some lofty educational mission statement they are fulfilling because they say they are fulfilling it, but to actually create environments where shear will and imagination collide to produce graduates capable of enriching the world with their unique gifts and creations rather than slotting into pre-fab jobs, in pre-fab buildings, living in pre-fab apartments, with their pre-fab partners, contributing pre-fab comments to pre-fab conversations about a pre-fab world.
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Accepted Review-lite [150-word cap]
Accepted, directed by Steve Pink and starring the "I'm a Mac" kid, Justin Long, as Bartleby Gaines, delivers the story of a kid who, once rejected from every college, pulls a fast one on his parents by creating a fake college, inadvertently ends up admitting 300 students, and necessarily creates a wild new model for collegiate education. Along the way, there are some needlessly gross parts in the film. Still, the embedded philosophical statements bring great relevance. At the end, Bartleby justifies the accreditation of his college in a powerful speech reminding us that to fulfill the promise colleges make to students they must ignite their passion for learning and empower them to become the thing they've always dreamed of becoming not put traditions and roadblocks in their way. Accepted, is a film with a palpable message wrapped in a film that should not be dismissed as teenage summer drivel.
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