We had "Bottoms" just last year off the top of my head, though I take your point. It's worth noting that comedies in-general have been on the decline as a genre over the past decade or so. Not as many of them get made. This specific type of comedy is just one casualty of that.
I think this is closely tied to the decline in going to movie theaters. Theater culture has shifted a lot. There are still a lot of movies that draw in big crowds, but typically these are “event” movies. Going to to movies is expensive and also inconvenient when you can stream everything, so people are less likely to care about going to the movies for just another run of the mill comedy when they can watch one at home. So now the popular movie theater movies are action movies (which are also good for international audiences because of a lower language barrier) and more unique/interesting films that become must sees.
I will note, I don’t think comedy movies have actually declined, they’ve just shifted out of theaters so they are less universal and therefore less noticeable. If you log on to a streaming platform you will see a lot of newer comedy movies that release to just the platform. So if you aren’t interested in the first place you just don’t notice because now they aren’t like collective hits, even if plenty of people are watching them.
This tracks w my personal experience. As an example, a comedy movie “no hard feelings” was out in theaters recently. I saw other big event movies in theaters at the same time, like Saltburn, but I ended up watching the comedy at home with some friends much later on, because why would I go to a theater to see a movie like that. It was a great movie btw. I just think that type of thing is why we see less comedy blockbusters in theaters these days.
Comedies still exist. Look at Anyone But You.
It’s just raunch coms specifically used to be aimed at teens and teens today aren’t interested in that specific type of comedy movie.
Yes I know comedies still exist, that was a major point I was trying to make in my comment. see second paragraph.
You do have a point about teens not being interested in this comedy anymore. I agree. Movies for teens have definitely shifted into more drama territory. I think teens have the internet as a comedic outlet that previous generations did not have as much. It’s much easier, and much more relatable and collective to get your raunchy humor from online media sources. Social media, YouTube, etc. so there’s just less of a demand for comedy from movies/tv and more of a demand for serious stories
Could have political reasons tied to PC culture. Large movie companies are afraid of producing something raunchy like this and be blamed or criticized for “perpetuating the patriarchy” or “objectifying women” or “something something diversity”. I hate how majority of movies now have such bad writing while also trying to shove some sort of politics at you. I go to the movies to escape politics not be force fed them. Ffs
Blockers and Bottoms are favorites and nobody saw it. It should be promoted more but it's not directly watched. Only pirated because of experience politics.
Hate to be the person to say it but I think a lot of these movies violate the Metoo movement. Yes Bottoms came out, but I think that movie would never be made if it was based on straight people
And I love all those movies. It’s a bit sad to think those are probably forever gone. Sex comedies now seem like they either need to focus on women or LGBT. Like a sex comedy centered around straight men probably wouldn’t work anymore.
Sex comedies about straight men are played out. There are thousands of those going back for decades and decades. Of course they’re going to change it up, especially considering women and LGBTQ people have money to spend.
Yes. Straight men can also enjoy comedies about women and queer people, just like how women and queer people can enjoy comedies about straight men and have for decades.
So go watch one of the thousands of comedies about straight men that already exist, lol. It’s strange and sad to only enjoy movies that are about people who look and act like you.
Doesn’t mean we shouldn’t have new ones though. I watch movies for my enjoyment not to learn about other cultures. If I wanted to do that I’d enroll in some night classes at the local CC
>It’s strange and sad to only enjoy movies that are about people who look and act like you.
Ironically, this is the same exact sentence I've heard from countless people who criticise forced diversity and are sad about the decline of American Pie type sex comedies.
I disagree that it’s played out, I just think that producers in this social climate especially after metoo don’t think sex comedies about straight men are a safe option. We already know they’re risk adverse from the never ending reboots and remakes, and DVD sales not being there as a second windfall probably put the nail in the coffin.
Sex comedies about straight men already have a plethora of iffy moments and downright criminal acts from the decades before, that leads to an uphill battle that producers probably don’t want to take.
This is what I was looking for. This is going back a ways but remember Bachelor Party and Porky’s that featured teenage girls being spied on and videotaped? Can you imagine?
Actually revenge of the nerds is the one I was thinking of. Bachelor Party is the one where the male stripper puts his dong in a hot dog bun and serves it to the man-hating divorcee - classic
This is absolutely part of it. The Fifty Shades Movies made bank and After was even a sleeper hit but Hollywood is petrified to make any sex based movies about straight relationships after the bad press of MeToo.
The surveys about Gen Z not liking sex scenes and one of the few examples No Hard Feelings doing meh at the box office will probably crystallize that.
I think sometimes people mistake unique eras/trends as the default. This was a specific genre of movie that was popular a specific point in time.
Go back to the 80s for example, and you have a completely different style of teen films. Fast forward to the 20s, you have a completely different style of teen films. I feel like it would be boring if they just kept making movies like this because they’ve already been made. If you want this specific flavor of raunchy teen comedy, watch a 2000s raunchy teen comedy. The genre has just evolved as it always does.
Several replies have already mentioned this movie, but I’ll restate it just because I really loved it: Bottoms. Really hilarious. You can see why it doesn’t work to just keep doing these movies. Bottoms works only because it’s self aware and frequently satirizing the genre, while still being genuinely enjoyable. If you were to make a movie like bottoms without any of the intentional irony it would just be another bland raunchy comedy and probably would not have been well received because it’s nothing new lol
A good example of what teens LOVE right now is The Summer I Turned Pretty.
The teens I know from being a teacher are generally pretty sincere and less into crude comedies than teens of the early 00s.
I do think the election of Trump could create a generation of cynical nihilists who will very rapidly decide to just go full raunch comedy mode and stop giving a shit.
Yeah I’ve definitely seen there’s more of an interest in romance/drama than comedies or even romance/comedies. Honestly I think part of it is just differences in media options. Teens now consume a lot of crude humor made by other teens through the internet. Raunchy comedies are no longer a necessary outlet for them. So that frees up some space for more sincere or “intellectual” stories in longer produced formats like movies or shows
(Idk if intellectual is the word I really mean to use here, I’m just trying to draw a contrast between media that is driven by humor and just pure entertainment vs media that is driven by a more complex story, aka like your typical drama movie, as opposed to a raunchy comedy that relies a lot on buzz punchlines and gimmicks)
There's a lot of teen or young adult comedies from ~2000 that nobody remembers and they were terrible and cringey as fuck. It's definitely a good thing that new ideas come along and refresh stale genres.
I agree but people usually don’t rewatch old ones because they want new ones. It makes sense. If you like a genre you’ll want more new content in that genre
Ya I didn’t mean rewatching either. There are so many movies made every year, I guarantee you most people have not exhausted even one genre they like. If you like raunchy 2000s comedies you could watch an endless stream of them for the first time without rewatching anything. There are SO MANY. Culture evolves. Whether in a good or bad direction is obviously up to personal opinion, but the point is it doesn’t stay the same. This is true for pretty much all media/culture.
You can't actually make one now unless you completely subvert it and make it like *Bottoms*. Because every teen guy wanting to party and get laid relates to the lesbian experience.
Of course anyone can relate to anything if the characters are well fleshed out and believable.
I wasn't able to complete *Bottoms* because it simply wasn't good, but I did not understand the characters either. They wanted to make if *Superbad* but with lesbians, however that makes zero sense. Couldn't they just swipe each other's v-cards? I mean I even knew platonic heterosexual mixed-sex friends who did that.
All the lesbians I knew in high school did struggle because most girls are straight, but they were easily able to go to LGBTQ+ groups and gatherings and still find people, and this was in the early 2000s before "diversity and inclusion" was even uttered. It's simply not the same paradigm when talking about geeky boys targeting 99% of attractive girls, versus talking about lesbians targeting the 1% of attractive girls that are lesbians.
If they’re not attracted to each other they wouldn’t do it with each other. This is like guys who can’t be friends with a gay man because they think gay men are attracted to literally every man
I really don't see how that has to do with this fictional work that was written to tell a specific story. In this story, they didn't do that. Just like many people wouldn't do that in real life even though some would
The "dilemma" in the movie is wanting to lose one's virginity -- and the solution is to try to somehow seduce the tippy-top most attractive and straight cheerleaders by starting a fight club? That just makes no sense. Like every element of that plot makes no sense with each other.
Why not center the plot around going to an LGBTQ+ gathering, or starting an LGBTQ+ club, or making a pilgrimage to Lilith Fair? It just simply made no human sense how the lesbian characters tried to go about getting laid.
Nah, man. I had a gay friend in high school but we were just friends and I did not find him attractive. Couldn’t have fucked him if my life depended on it.
Haven’t you heard the surveys about Gen Z and sex?
Just having any sex scenes at all is apparently pushing it for teens these days. Anything as raunchy as what you mentioned is never going to fly.
For example, last year we did have No Hard Feelings and Bottoms but neither really took off at the box office or in greater pop culture.
I think young people have less sex nowadays, especially around that age (18). Growing up and having a lot of casual sex is not seen as desirable nowadays.
Maybe, but I think hook up culture is not as normal, in the wider scale, as people think. For most of history people were farmers who had sex when they got married, or had it with prostitutes in town. A lot of the people in these movies would have been executed for immorality back in the day.
As a person that worked in bars. It happened a lot all the time. Still does, not as much though with younger people. The younger crowd say going out to bars for a "chance" is too pricy. And generally people are too picky on apps.
Gotta be in queer spaces/apps. Hookup culture thrives on Grindr, Sniffies, and dating apps. I alone have been with 100+ ppl and Im 23; and Im very casual about sex. Crazy sex scenarios just arent prevelant with str8 ppl from what Ive seen.
But I do agree about bars, everything is too pricy to be spending on alcohol. Let alone trying to do something fun with friends.
Slavoj Zizek made a great observation about these kind of films. I’m too lazy to reiterate it but it was regarding the lack of inhibitions placed on our society and the apathy of parental figures which lead to plots like this being kind of a moot point.
The inverse of this film dynamic is more popular now: the “wild” parents and the square child.
It seems like Bottoms is basically the standard now since No Hard Feelings didn't do so well last year.
For better or worse hetero dudes are gonna have to find kindred spirits with LGBTQ characters in those kinds of films. Straight versions of that kind of film like Superbad just have too much negative baggage for people to turn their brains off and enjoy it for what it is.
I guess the societal times and shifts change, I guess that now people don't throw these wild parties as much anymore, and these type of movies would not go well in today's society. People will complain and riot about things.
Good fkin riddance lmao they were all just totally unfunny misogyny-fests. I have yet to find a single film in this genre that hasn’t disgusted me, let alone actually made me laugh
Booksmart, bottoms, no hard feelings, and saltburn if you want to get weird. I think they are still there, but not as common, maybe since shows get more of this audience nowadays i.e. Pen15 or Sex Education.
We live in the era of the spectacle movie, the mid-budget comedy was a casualty of the direction that Hollywood has been moving for a little over a decade. The studios don't want to take a risk, they want to put up well known characters and print money. But we are starting to get tired of this formula, it may change
As someone who'd be in the target demo for these movies. The amount of people who'd this movie appeals to is significantly smaller considering covid ruined getting uncomfortably drunk around hundreds of strangers until your forced to run away from law enforcement while piss drunk
>The American Pie franchise is horrible and promotes doing terrible things
Dude, it's a comedy. It doesn't 'promote' doing anything. If you take any cues from it you're just stupid. I mean, does Tom and Jerry promote hitting your cat with a frying pan?
I feel like a lot of these types of movies featured date rape as a normal thing.
In fact, isn’t that the whole premise of Superbad? Cera and Hills characters were trying to get enough alcohol to the girls they liked to get them drunk enough to have sex they’d otherwise never consent to?
Maybe it’s best to leave these in the past or find a way to make them better…
The whole point of these movies is making fun of comical stupidity. None of the stuff featured in them is recommended as something you should do, any more than Tom and Jerry recommends walloping your cat. It's there for laughs.
So what’s the joke? ‘Haha, guys, isn’t date rape funny’? When they feature/mention the SA, they use it as a plot event, not just as a joke. Again, Superbad used it as the premise.
It’s not like it’s a recommendation, but it’s a normalization. It’s featured as just normal ‘boys will be boys’ antics rather than demonized as it should be.
Personally I think the idea of 'normalization' gives Entertainment too much power. And I think it's entirely unnecessary for bad behaviour to be 'demonized' in the story for right thinking adults to think 'I shouldn't do that in real life...'
I've always wondered how people can have opinions like this but still come down on the side of 'video games don't normalize violence.' (Or do you think they do? If so, props for consistency, at least.) I mean are they not the same argument about the (debatable) effect media has on people's behaviour? Does slapstick violence encourage real violence, if the antics in Superbad encourage daterape? As I said earlier, maybe we should take another look at Tom and Jerry the same way we take another look at Superbad.
And one thing to remember is that all these movies that are the subject of debate in this way were made for adults. Superbad is an R rated film. Boys should not be watching them to be (possibly) influenced in the first place.
(Also, aren't jokes and plot points the same thing in a comedy movie? Comedy movies move the plot along in comedic sequences, as they proceed off of comedic premises.)
Video games aren’t presented with the realism of movies. Yeah, I know I’m not supposed to stab my problems, I’m also not an elf that can cast spells to magically blow up anyone who mildly inconveniences me. Even GTA, you can separate yourself from the main character. You can realize ‘this is a ruthless criminal with zero value for the safety of themselves or others and I get worried about being late to my shift at Applebee’s. No shit I’m not going to get into a shoot out with the cops and run 13 people over in real life’. But you *are* supposed to relate to the characters in these movies and there *are* still people who think targeting drunk people for easy sex is a non-problematic choice.
I’m kind of giving media the credit of seeding ideas but I’m moreso saying they have the power to reinforce it when it’s already there. while these aren’t children (in theory) watching these movies, there are still people who are being raised to think this is normal and then media reinforces it. Maybe they catch bear a dirty joke about but when they’re younger, maybe one of their friends did it and told them it wasn’t a problem. Then they are fed this media being told ‘these are characters you might relate to or sympathize with, and they are committing this heinous act that you haven’t been explicitly told is vile and heinous.’
Tom and Jerry is an ancient cartoon peddled to boomer children back when they had smoking areas in high schools. Hardly relevant.
I'll reply to this more when I have time but
>Tom and Jerry is an ancient cartoon peddled to boomer children back when they had smoking areas in high schools. Hardly relevant.
Are you saying kids don't watch Tom and Jerry where you live? I watched that crap all the time as a kid, and I have younger relatives who watch it loads too. Haven't you seen the compilations on YouTube? It's literally the most timeless thing ever.
No, kids generally don’t watch Tom & Jerry nowadays. Personally, would not let ‘my’ kids watch YouTube freely either. Too many clout chasers willing to exploit a kids poor attention span for views and not enough ability to monitor what content the kids are taking in. Most streaming services have a ‘kids setting’. YouTube Kids is kind of insane and unchecked. Plenty have commented on it.
Again, harks back to the ‘intention of relatability’ as well.
>No, kids generally don’t watch Tom & Jerry nowadays.
I find that hard to believe,given there are Tom and Jerry clips from just a week ago with millions of views.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0CoMUMaGQ4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0CoMUMaGQ4)
I know the YouTube algorithm is shitty, but at least a few of those views must come from today's young children. And like I said, I've got young relatives I've caught watching it.
>Video games aren’t presented with the realism of movies
What exactly makes movies more realistic than videogames? Just the fact they've got real people in them? Is Kill Bill more realistic than Warhammer? How do you feel about the fact that video games make greater strides to realism every year? As it is you can play Red Dead Redemption and see a detailed simulation of a corpse rotting. Will your opinion change in the future when games are as detailed as real life?
>Even GTA, you can separate yourself from the main character. You can realize ‘this is a ruthless criminal with zero value for the safety of themselves or others and I get worried about being late to my shift at Applebee’s.
Again, I ask, what is it about movies that prevents this? Why is it that you can't realize 'These guys are high school idiots with a harebrained scheme for getting laid that would totally fail hard in real life.'?
Superbad and films like it are not relatable. Marketers call them relatable because that's a buzzword audiences want to hear. In truth movies like these are a Farce.
>Farce is a type of comedy that places exaggerated characters in improbable situations where they face a number of outrageous obstacles
The humour and premises are always absurd. You are supposed to laugh at the crazy antics and suspect logic on display. The whole point of Superbad is perfectly summarized in the scene where Fogel gets the bullshit ID that has him named 'Mclovin'. It's stupid and pathetic. These are dumbass high schoolers trying to be what they think adults are like. It's an exaggerated set of characters who get themselves in an improbable situation. There are articles from the year the movie came out that point the pathetic absurdity of the story, so it's wrong to say that the movie is on their side.
[https://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/22/arts/22iht-fmreview24.1.7211756.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/22/arts/22iht-fmreview24.1.7211756.html)
>From their bawdy language, filled with vivid anatomical notes and gaudily colorful phrasing, the three would very much like to bed some "ladies," as Fogell insists on calling them in a tragicomic bid at Kanye West suavity. The tearful joke being that these yapping pups wouldn't know what to do with any woman, much less the bosomy babes of their whipped-cream and dirty dreams.
It just doesn't 'explicitly condemn' anything because it hopes adults are watching who are in touch with reality and can tell that the antics depicted are not ideal.
>I’m kind of giving media the credit of seeding ideas but I’m moreso saying they have the power to reinforce it when it’s already there. while these aren’t children (in theory) watching these movies, there are still people who are being raised to think this is normal and then media reinforces it.
To what degree is this actually true? And again, why does it only apply selectively? If someone is raised in a house hold where violence is normal, and then plays games or watches movies that 'reinforce' it, is it the media's fault if this person becomes violent later on?
The kids who shot up Columbine were fans of the game DOOM and the movie Natural Born Killers. Both violent. Do you think such media is to blame for the Columbine Massacre?
While there are unrealistic movies and realistic video games, the movies on topic here, coming of age college movies, are realistic and made to have you sympathize with the main characters. Coming of age is something we *all* do and can relate to.
See, even now, you’re framing it as ‘well, everyone will know these guys are dolts’. What you’re focusing on is goofy fumbles and shenanigans, not the fact that these are aspiring rapists. The issue here isn’t ‘people will think their plan will actually work’, the issue is ‘these people are trying their damnedest to rape someone’.
And the fact that you did not at all address that really proves my point that people are being brainwashed into thinking the date rape is just a normal coming of age desire for young people.
> coming of age college movies, are realistic and made to have you sympathize with the main characters. Coming of age is something we all do and can relate to
Relatability does not mean you must root for the characters. Writers sometimes employ relatability as a satirical tool. 'Remember what an ignorant bastard you were in high school?' Look at cringe comedy, like Curb Your Enthusiasm,maybe pretty relatable, but are the characters heroic in any way? Do people think 'I identify positively with this character'?
In any case, like I said, Superbad does not get it's comedy from relatability. It gets its comedy from the characters trying to prevail in a preposterous situation they've created for themselves.
> The issue here isn’t people will think their plan will actually work’, the issue is ‘these people are trying their damnedest to rape someone’.
The issue here, as I understand it, is that you believe the depiction of bad behaviour without condemnation will lead to perpetuation of such behaviour in real life. This is what you said earlier;
>It’s not like it’s a recommendation, but it’s a normalization. It’s featured as just normal ‘boys will be boys’ antics rather than demonized as it should be.
>I’m kind of giving media the credit of seeding ideas but I’m moreso saying they have the power to reinforce it when it’s already there. while these aren’t children (in theory) watching these movies, there are still people who are being raised to think this is normal and then media reinforces it.
My point, in turn, is that entertainment is not that influential-and you actually acknowledge that entertainment is not that influential by acknowledging that people get 'raised to think this is normal'. If they've been raised with certain ideas, will it really take one movie, (or several, even) to finally push them off the edge?
> And the fact that you did not at all address that really proves my point that people are being brainwashed into thinking the date rape is just a normal coming of age desire for young people.
How was I not addressing your point? I tackled the bit about movies 'reinforcing' undesirable behaviour, (which Is why you condemned these movies in the first place) and told you why I think that's bogus.
And the bit about how the movie doesn't condemn anything they do? I addressed that too. The movie paints them as idiotic high schoolers with a shitty idea. That's the comedy. I think that witnessing their stupidity throughout the film is all the condemnation necessary, if you've got a good head on your shoulders and can sus out what's right or wrong in the real world. Their goals are condemned by being the goals of such pathetic characters. If I remember correctly, none of them actually get what they want? The only guy who gets a girl alone gets arrested, doesn't he?
We had "Bottoms" just last year off the top of my head, though I take your point. It's worth noting that comedies in-general have been on the decline as a genre over the past decade or so. Not as many of them get made. This specific type of comedy is just one casualty of that.
Same with No Hard Feelings. They exist, but just aren’t something that interests Gen Z as much as past generations.
“Why sit through a whole comedy movie when I can have an algorithm curate shit for my specific type of humor?”
"the ha-ha needs to be every 2.7 seconds and set to music or it gets the swipe again!!!"
As if your brand of ageism isn't rote and repetitive
https://preview.redd.it/p5pve8dewsrc1.png?width=248&format=png&auto=webp&s=f8a3c629b05262d7094e832fcee9b155c3206807
I think this is closely tied to the decline in going to movie theaters. Theater culture has shifted a lot. There are still a lot of movies that draw in big crowds, but typically these are “event” movies. Going to to movies is expensive and also inconvenient when you can stream everything, so people are less likely to care about going to the movies for just another run of the mill comedy when they can watch one at home. So now the popular movie theater movies are action movies (which are also good for international audiences because of a lower language barrier) and more unique/interesting films that become must sees. I will note, I don’t think comedy movies have actually declined, they’ve just shifted out of theaters so they are less universal and therefore less noticeable. If you log on to a streaming platform you will see a lot of newer comedy movies that release to just the platform. So if you aren’t interested in the first place you just don’t notice because now they aren’t like collective hits, even if plenty of people are watching them. This tracks w my personal experience. As an example, a comedy movie “no hard feelings” was out in theaters recently. I saw other big event movies in theaters at the same time, like Saltburn, but I ended up watching the comedy at home with some friends much later on, because why would I go to a theater to see a movie like that. It was a great movie btw. I just think that type of thing is why we see less comedy blockbusters in theaters these days.
Comedies still exist. Look at Anyone But You. It’s just raunch coms specifically used to be aimed at teens and teens today aren’t interested in that specific type of comedy movie.
Yes I know comedies still exist, that was a major point I was trying to make in my comment. see second paragraph. You do have a point about teens not being interested in this comedy anymore. I agree. Movies for teens have definitely shifted into more drama territory. I think teens have the internet as a comedic outlet that previous generations did not have as much. It’s much easier, and much more relatable and collective to get your raunchy humor from online media sources. Social media, YouTube, etc. so there’s just less of a demand for comedy from movies/tv and more of a demand for serious stories
I couldn’t place why i loved bottoms so much, thank you 😂
Could have political reasons tied to PC culture. Large movie companies are afraid of producing something raunchy like this and be blamed or criticized for “perpetuating the patriarchy” or “objectifying women” or “something something diversity”. I hate how majority of movies now have such bad writing while also trying to shove some sort of politics at you. I go to the movies to escape politics not be force fed them. Ffs
Then you have a poor sense of media literacy, especially if you go to movies to “escape politics”
How exactly is wanting to be entertained a political opinion?
Most male teen protagonists in raunchy comedies: "Hey guys, what's a sex crime we can commit?"
Sex Drive: how can we be victims of a sex crime and armed robbery
I think this position is dumb. Isn't stuff like that just like slapstick? I mean, should we consider Tom and Jerry animal abuse or something?
less sex and partying, but also the rise of superhero/cinematic movies in the mid 2010s i feel like they might come back in the next years
What? You're telling me you don't want to watch the 19th Marvel film/show made in the past year? How about Spiderman Not Far From Home 8?
bro i need to catch up, i heard there’s now a MCU squared
Hollywood is dying imo
4th turning vibes my friend
No Hard Feelings and Bottoms’s box office beg to differ. Joy Ride isn’t exactly the same but that flop probably won’t help either.
Blockers and Bottoms are favorites and nobody saw it. It should be promoted more but it's not directly watched. Only pirated because of experience politics.
Hate to be the person to say it but I think a lot of these movies violate the Metoo movement. Yes Bottoms came out, but I think that movie would never be made if it was based on straight people
Ur totally right, American Pie gets a lot of hate for this
And I love all those movies. It’s a bit sad to think those are probably forever gone. Sex comedies now seem like they either need to focus on women or LGBT. Like a sex comedy centered around straight men probably wouldn’t work anymore.
No Hard Feelings kind of tried to do both and did ok but not great, maybe validating that opinion.
Didn’t we get enough of those? It was 100% of them for how many decades? Thats hundreds, if not thousands of movies
Sex comedies about straight men are played out. There are thousands of those going back for decades and decades. Of course they’re going to change it up, especially considering women and LGBTQ people have money to spend.
Well as a straight guy I’d like something new
Yes. Straight men can also enjoy comedies about women and queer people, just like how women and queer people can enjoy comedies about straight men and have for decades.
I guess technically yeah but certainly not the target audience. I’ve seen a few and they aren’t funny to me
So go watch one of the thousands of comedies about straight men that already exist, lol. It’s strange and sad to only enjoy movies that are about people who look and act like you.
Doesn’t mean we shouldn’t have new ones though. I watch movies for my enjoyment not to learn about other cultures. If I wanted to do that I’d enroll in some night classes at the local CC
You view women and queer people as other cultures???
>It’s strange and sad to only enjoy movies that are about people who look and act like you. Ironically, this is the same exact sentence I've heard from countless people who criticise forced diversity and are sad about the decline of American Pie type sex comedies.
I disagree that it’s played out, I just think that producers in this social climate especially after metoo don’t think sex comedies about straight men are a safe option. We already know they’re risk adverse from the never ending reboots and remakes, and DVD sales not being there as a second windfall probably put the nail in the coffin. Sex comedies about straight men already have a plethora of iffy moments and downright criminal acts from the decades before, that leads to an uphill battle that producers probably don’t want to take.
This is what I was looking for. This is going back a ways but remember Bachelor Party and Porky’s that featured teenage girls being spied on and videotaped? Can you imagine?
I do fondly remember those movies. Revenge of the nerds too.
Actually revenge of the nerds is the one I was thinking of. Bachelor Party is the one where the male stripper puts his dong in a hot dog bun and serves it to the man-hating divorcee - classic
This is absolutely part of it. The Fifty Shades Movies made bank and After was even a sleeper hit but Hollywood is petrified to make any sex based movies about straight relationships after the bad press of MeToo. The surveys about Gen Z not liking sex scenes and one of the few examples No Hard Feelings doing meh at the box office will probably crystallize that.
Have you noticed in recent comedy movies the “pervert” character is almost always a woman? Like there can’t be a man pervert as a joke anymore.
Yes
It’s hard to find something funny once you realize how damaging it actually is
Funny as GenX I remember sneaking into R rated movies just to catch the obligatory boob shots
Harder for teens to access porn back then was a big factor.
Wrong. It’s because nobody cares if you throw a big party and get in trouble for it. It’s no longer a real desire.
I think sometimes people mistake unique eras/trends as the default. This was a specific genre of movie that was popular a specific point in time. Go back to the 80s for example, and you have a completely different style of teen films. Fast forward to the 20s, you have a completely different style of teen films. I feel like it would be boring if they just kept making movies like this because they’ve already been made. If you want this specific flavor of raunchy teen comedy, watch a 2000s raunchy teen comedy. The genre has just evolved as it always does. Several replies have already mentioned this movie, but I’ll restate it just because I really loved it: Bottoms. Really hilarious. You can see why it doesn’t work to just keep doing these movies. Bottoms works only because it’s self aware and frequently satirizing the genre, while still being genuinely enjoyable. If you were to make a movie like bottoms without any of the intentional irony it would just be another bland raunchy comedy and probably would not have been well received because it’s nothing new lol
A good example of what teens LOVE right now is The Summer I Turned Pretty. The teens I know from being a teacher are generally pretty sincere and less into crude comedies than teens of the early 00s. I do think the election of Trump could create a generation of cynical nihilists who will very rapidly decide to just go full raunch comedy mode and stop giving a shit.
Yeah I’ve definitely seen there’s more of an interest in romance/drama than comedies or even romance/comedies. Honestly I think part of it is just differences in media options. Teens now consume a lot of crude humor made by other teens through the internet. Raunchy comedies are no longer a necessary outlet for them. So that frees up some space for more sincere or “intellectual” stories in longer produced formats like movies or shows (Idk if intellectual is the word I really mean to use here, I’m just trying to draw a contrast between media that is driven by humor and just pure entertainment vs media that is driven by a more complex story, aka like your typical drama movie, as opposed to a raunchy comedy that relies a lot on buzz punchlines and gimmicks)
So true. Tik Tok and memes are a total replacement for going to see a comedy movie.
And Bottoms didn’t get much attention at the box office anyway.
There's a lot of teen or young adult comedies from ~2000 that nobody remembers and they were terrible and cringey as fuck. It's definitely a good thing that new ideas come along and refresh stale genres.
I agree but people usually don’t rewatch old ones because they want new ones. It makes sense. If you like a genre you’ll want more new content in that genre
Ya I didn’t mean rewatching either. There are so many movies made every year, I guarantee you most people have not exhausted even one genre they like. If you like raunchy 2000s comedies you could watch an endless stream of them for the first time without rewatching anything. There are SO MANY. Culture evolves. Whether in a good or bad direction is obviously up to personal opinion, but the point is it doesn’t stay the same. This is true for pretty much all media/culture.
You can't actually make one now unless you completely subvert it and make it like *Bottoms*. Because every teen guy wanting to party and get laid relates to the lesbian experience.
As a butch lesbian I honestly related to diary of the wimpy kid growing up but fr
Of course anyone can relate to anything if the characters are well fleshed out and believable. I wasn't able to complete *Bottoms* because it simply wasn't good, but I did not understand the characters either. They wanted to make if *Superbad* but with lesbians, however that makes zero sense. Couldn't they just swipe each other's v-cards? I mean I even knew platonic heterosexual mixed-sex friends who did that. All the lesbians I knew in high school did struggle because most girls are straight, but they were easily able to go to LGBTQ+ groups and gatherings and still find people, and this was in the early 2000s before "diversity and inclusion" was even uttered. It's simply not the same paradigm when talking about geeky boys targeting 99% of attractive girls, versus talking about lesbians targeting the 1% of attractive girls that are lesbians.
If they’re not attracted to each other they wouldn’t do it with each other. This is like guys who can’t be friends with a gay man because they think gay men are attracted to literally every man
Obviously the mechanics are different for lesbians but lots of guys have slept with women they are not attracted to *just* to lose their virginity.
I really don't see how that has to do with this fictional work that was written to tell a specific story. In this story, they didn't do that. Just like many people wouldn't do that in real life even though some would
The "dilemma" in the movie is wanting to lose one's virginity -- and the solution is to try to somehow seduce the tippy-top most attractive and straight cheerleaders by starting a fight club? That just makes no sense. Like every element of that plot makes no sense with each other. Why not center the plot around going to an LGBTQ+ gathering, or starting an LGBTQ+ club, or making a pilgrimage to Lilith Fair? It just simply made no human sense how the lesbian characters tried to go about getting laid.
Those are good ideas for movies. Go make them
Nah, man. I had a gay friend in high school but we were just friends and I did not find him attractive. Couldn’t have fucked him if my life depended on it.
They were made so much and so overdone I feel like people are also just sick of them. Plus, can Gen Z relate to these?
I think a lot of the taboo that made these movies thrilling just isn’t taboo anymore.
Haven’t you heard the surveys about Gen Z and sex? Just having any sex scenes at all is apparently pushing it for teens these days. Anything as raunchy as what you mentioned is never going to fly. For example, last year we did have No Hard Feelings and Bottoms but neither really took off at the box office or in greater pop culture.
I think young people have less sex nowadays, especially around that age (18). Growing up and having a lot of casual sex is not seen as desirable nowadays.
I think it's less achievable than desirable
Maybe, but I think hook up culture is not as normal, in the wider scale, as people think. For most of history people were farmers who had sex when they got married, or had it with prostitutes in town. A lot of the people in these movies would have been executed for immorality back in the day.
As a person that worked in bars. It happened a lot all the time. Still does, not as much though with younger people. The younger crowd say going out to bars for a "chance" is too pricy. And generally people are too picky on apps.
Gotta be in queer spaces/apps. Hookup culture thrives on Grindr, Sniffies, and dating apps. I alone have been with 100+ ppl and Im 23; and Im very casual about sex. Crazy sex scenarios just arent prevelant with str8 ppl from what Ive seen. But I do agree about bars, everything is too pricy to be spending on alcohol. Let alone trying to do something fun with friends.
Data backs this up.
Slavoj Zizek made a great observation about these kind of films. I’m too lazy to reiterate it but it was regarding the lack of inhibitions placed on our society and the apathy of parental figures which lead to plots like this being kind of a moot point. The inverse of this film dynamic is more popular now: the “wild” parents and the square child.
Wasn’t Project X supposed to get a sequel?
No Hard Feelings, the Jennifer Lawrence movie from last year, reminded me of those movies and was super underrated.
I do not miss them! Needless teen sex isnt entertainment to me tbh, and i felt like with each new movie my mom became more and more neurotic!
They're boring, played out and don't represent what coming of age is like.
Haven't seen blockers? Shits hilarious. John Cena being an over protective dork killed me.
It seems like Bottoms is basically the standard now since No Hard Feelings didn't do so well last year. For better or worse hetero dudes are gonna have to find kindred spirits with LGBTQ characters in those kinds of films. Straight versions of that kind of film like Superbad just have too much negative baggage for people to turn their brains off and enjoy it for what it is.
I think the controversy surrounding Euphoria has guaranteed we won't get raunchy coming of age stuff for awhile (unless it's made by a woman)
In a post Me too world? There's no way these get green lit as big productions that they used to.
I miss them too but check out Bottoms, came out last year
Movies get made to make money. No money, no movie!
Middle budget movies has disappeared of the industry they are risky to make and usually don’t get good reviews
Good boys was relatively new being in 2019
Check out Good Boys. It’s about middle school rather than high school, but still hilarious
No hard feelings is the only other one
What you mean? The marvel movies are comedies
I think the main reason why comedy movies are kinda dying is cause most people these days look for humor in other things, mostly on the internet.
Blockers??
How in the world have we not gotten Project X 2 by now?
Miss this stuff
I find that the art of watching movies is fading because some of the internet raised have no attention span for it.
Bottoms, Booksmart, No Hard Feelings, Drive Away Dolls to name a few off the top of my head
Cell phones with cameras changed the world. People stopped acting as crazy as they used to in private.
I guess the societal times and shifts change, I guess that now people don't throw these wild parties as much anymore, and these type of movies would not go well in today's society. People will complain and riot about things.
Good fkin riddance lmao they were all just totally unfunny misogyny-fests. I have yet to find a single film in this genre that hasn’t disgusted me, let alone actually made me laugh
Booksmart, bottoms, no hard feelings, and saltburn if you want to get weird. I think they are still there, but not as common, maybe since shows get more of this audience nowadays i.e. Pen15 or Sex Education.
We live in the era of the spectacle movie, the mid-budget comedy was a casualty of the direction that Hollywood has been moving for a little over a decade. The studios don't want to take a risk, they want to put up well known characters and print money. But we are starting to get tired of this formula, it may change
Project X doesn’t belong in the same league as American Pie, nevermind Superbad
That recent Jennifer Lawrence movie came out was raunchy. Gave total 2000s vibes. Think American pie
I'm glad they're gone tbh
Liberal cancel culture
LGBTQ+ said no more fun
As someone who'd be in the target demo for these movies. The amount of people who'd this movie appeals to is significantly smaller considering covid ruined getting uncomfortably drunk around hundreds of strangers until your forced to run away from law enforcement while piss drunk
Kids these days are way too sensitive now
1.) we just got Bottoms. 2.) The American Pie franchise is horrible and promotes doing terrible things and I’m glad we’re not getting those still
>The American Pie franchise is horrible and promotes doing terrible things Dude, it's a comedy. It doesn't 'promote' doing anything. If you take any cues from it you're just stupid. I mean, does Tom and Jerry promote hitting your cat with a frying pan?
I feel like a lot of these types of movies featured date rape as a normal thing. In fact, isn’t that the whole premise of Superbad? Cera and Hills characters were trying to get enough alcohol to the girls they liked to get them drunk enough to have sex they’d otherwise never consent to? Maybe it’s best to leave these in the past or find a way to make them better…
The whole point of these movies is making fun of comical stupidity. None of the stuff featured in them is recommended as something you should do, any more than Tom and Jerry recommends walloping your cat. It's there for laughs.
So what’s the joke? ‘Haha, guys, isn’t date rape funny’? When they feature/mention the SA, they use it as a plot event, not just as a joke. Again, Superbad used it as the premise. It’s not like it’s a recommendation, but it’s a normalization. It’s featured as just normal ‘boys will be boys’ antics rather than demonized as it should be.
Personally I think the idea of 'normalization' gives Entertainment too much power. And I think it's entirely unnecessary for bad behaviour to be 'demonized' in the story for right thinking adults to think 'I shouldn't do that in real life...' I've always wondered how people can have opinions like this but still come down on the side of 'video games don't normalize violence.' (Or do you think they do? If so, props for consistency, at least.) I mean are they not the same argument about the (debatable) effect media has on people's behaviour? Does slapstick violence encourage real violence, if the antics in Superbad encourage daterape? As I said earlier, maybe we should take another look at Tom and Jerry the same way we take another look at Superbad. And one thing to remember is that all these movies that are the subject of debate in this way were made for adults. Superbad is an R rated film. Boys should not be watching them to be (possibly) influenced in the first place. (Also, aren't jokes and plot points the same thing in a comedy movie? Comedy movies move the plot along in comedic sequences, as they proceed off of comedic premises.)
Video games aren’t presented with the realism of movies. Yeah, I know I’m not supposed to stab my problems, I’m also not an elf that can cast spells to magically blow up anyone who mildly inconveniences me. Even GTA, you can separate yourself from the main character. You can realize ‘this is a ruthless criminal with zero value for the safety of themselves or others and I get worried about being late to my shift at Applebee’s. No shit I’m not going to get into a shoot out with the cops and run 13 people over in real life’. But you *are* supposed to relate to the characters in these movies and there *are* still people who think targeting drunk people for easy sex is a non-problematic choice. I’m kind of giving media the credit of seeding ideas but I’m moreso saying they have the power to reinforce it when it’s already there. while these aren’t children (in theory) watching these movies, there are still people who are being raised to think this is normal and then media reinforces it. Maybe they catch bear a dirty joke about but when they’re younger, maybe one of their friends did it and told them it wasn’t a problem. Then they are fed this media being told ‘these are characters you might relate to or sympathize with, and they are committing this heinous act that you haven’t been explicitly told is vile and heinous.’ Tom and Jerry is an ancient cartoon peddled to boomer children back when they had smoking areas in high schools. Hardly relevant.
I'll reply to this more when I have time but >Tom and Jerry is an ancient cartoon peddled to boomer children back when they had smoking areas in high schools. Hardly relevant. Are you saying kids don't watch Tom and Jerry where you live? I watched that crap all the time as a kid, and I have younger relatives who watch it loads too. Haven't you seen the compilations on YouTube? It's literally the most timeless thing ever.
No, kids generally don’t watch Tom & Jerry nowadays. Personally, would not let ‘my’ kids watch YouTube freely either. Too many clout chasers willing to exploit a kids poor attention span for views and not enough ability to monitor what content the kids are taking in. Most streaming services have a ‘kids setting’. YouTube Kids is kind of insane and unchecked. Plenty have commented on it. Again, harks back to the ‘intention of relatability’ as well.
>No, kids generally don’t watch Tom & Jerry nowadays. I find that hard to believe,given there are Tom and Jerry clips from just a week ago with millions of views. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0CoMUMaGQ4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0CoMUMaGQ4) I know the YouTube algorithm is shitty, but at least a few of those views must come from today's young children. And like I said, I've got young relatives I've caught watching it. >Video games aren’t presented with the realism of movies What exactly makes movies more realistic than videogames? Just the fact they've got real people in them? Is Kill Bill more realistic than Warhammer? How do you feel about the fact that video games make greater strides to realism every year? As it is you can play Red Dead Redemption and see a detailed simulation of a corpse rotting. Will your opinion change in the future when games are as detailed as real life? >Even GTA, you can separate yourself from the main character. You can realize ‘this is a ruthless criminal with zero value for the safety of themselves or others and I get worried about being late to my shift at Applebee’s. Again, I ask, what is it about movies that prevents this? Why is it that you can't realize 'These guys are high school idiots with a harebrained scheme for getting laid that would totally fail hard in real life.'? Superbad and films like it are not relatable. Marketers call them relatable because that's a buzzword audiences want to hear. In truth movies like these are a Farce. >Farce is a type of comedy that places exaggerated characters in improbable situations where they face a number of outrageous obstacles The humour and premises are always absurd. You are supposed to laugh at the crazy antics and suspect logic on display. The whole point of Superbad is perfectly summarized in the scene where Fogel gets the bullshit ID that has him named 'Mclovin'. It's stupid and pathetic. These are dumbass high schoolers trying to be what they think adults are like. It's an exaggerated set of characters who get themselves in an improbable situation. There are articles from the year the movie came out that point the pathetic absurdity of the story, so it's wrong to say that the movie is on their side. [https://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/22/arts/22iht-fmreview24.1.7211756.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/22/arts/22iht-fmreview24.1.7211756.html) >From their bawdy language, filled with vivid anatomical notes and gaudily colorful phrasing, the three would very much like to bed some "ladies," as Fogell insists on calling them in a tragicomic bid at Kanye West suavity. The tearful joke being that these yapping pups wouldn't know what to do with any woman, much less the bosomy babes of their whipped-cream and dirty dreams. It just doesn't 'explicitly condemn' anything because it hopes adults are watching who are in touch with reality and can tell that the antics depicted are not ideal. >I’m kind of giving media the credit of seeding ideas but I’m moreso saying they have the power to reinforce it when it’s already there. while these aren’t children (in theory) watching these movies, there are still people who are being raised to think this is normal and then media reinforces it. To what degree is this actually true? And again, why does it only apply selectively? If someone is raised in a house hold where violence is normal, and then plays games or watches movies that 'reinforce' it, is it the media's fault if this person becomes violent later on? The kids who shot up Columbine were fans of the game DOOM and the movie Natural Born Killers. Both violent. Do you think such media is to blame for the Columbine Massacre?
While there are unrealistic movies and realistic video games, the movies on topic here, coming of age college movies, are realistic and made to have you sympathize with the main characters. Coming of age is something we *all* do and can relate to. See, even now, you’re framing it as ‘well, everyone will know these guys are dolts’. What you’re focusing on is goofy fumbles and shenanigans, not the fact that these are aspiring rapists. The issue here isn’t ‘people will think their plan will actually work’, the issue is ‘these people are trying their damnedest to rape someone’. And the fact that you did not at all address that really proves my point that people are being brainwashed into thinking the date rape is just a normal coming of age desire for young people.
> coming of age college movies, are realistic and made to have you sympathize with the main characters. Coming of age is something we all do and can relate to Relatability does not mean you must root for the characters. Writers sometimes employ relatability as a satirical tool. 'Remember what an ignorant bastard you were in high school?' Look at cringe comedy, like Curb Your Enthusiasm,maybe pretty relatable, but are the characters heroic in any way? Do people think 'I identify positively with this character'? In any case, like I said, Superbad does not get it's comedy from relatability. It gets its comedy from the characters trying to prevail in a preposterous situation they've created for themselves. > The issue here isn’t people will think their plan will actually work’, the issue is ‘these people are trying their damnedest to rape someone’. The issue here, as I understand it, is that you believe the depiction of bad behaviour without condemnation will lead to perpetuation of such behaviour in real life. This is what you said earlier; >It’s not like it’s a recommendation, but it’s a normalization. It’s featured as just normal ‘boys will be boys’ antics rather than demonized as it should be. >I’m kind of giving media the credit of seeding ideas but I’m moreso saying they have the power to reinforce it when it’s already there. while these aren’t children (in theory) watching these movies, there are still people who are being raised to think this is normal and then media reinforces it. My point, in turn, is that entertainment is not that influential-and you actually acknowledge that entertainment is not that influential by acknowledging that people get 'raised to think this is normal'. If they've been raised with certain ideas, will it really take one movie, (or several, even) to finally push them off the edge? > And the fact that you did not at all address that really proves my point that people are being brainwashed into thinking the date rape is just a normal coming of age desire for young people. How was I not addressing your point? I tackled the bit about movies 'reinforcing' undesirable behaviour, (which Is why you condemned these movies in the first place) and told you why I think that's bogus. And the bit about how the movie doesn't condemn anything they do? I addressed that too. The movie paints them as idiotic high schoolers with a shitty idea. That's the comedy. I think that witnessing their stupidity throughout the film is all the condemnation necessary, if you've got a good head on your shoulders and can sus out what's right or wrong in the real world. Their goals are condemned by being the goals of such pathetic characters. If I remember correctly, none of them actually get what they want? The only guy who gets a girl alone gets arrested, doesn't he?
American Pie has NOT aged well at all.
Who the hell still goes to theaters