Superbad (2007)

5 months ago

LOVE IS STRANGE: SETH + EVAN 4EVA

by Erika Schmidt

Superbad is a love story.

You might not realize it until the very last frames of the film, when Seth (Jonah Hill) and Evan (Michael Cera) have finally scored impromptu dates with their respective crushes and are parting ways at the top of a suburban mall escalator. As Seth descends on the escalator with Jules (Emma Stone), he turns to look back as Evan slowly slides out of view. In the looks the boys exchange are those complex emotions we’ve all experienced during our Wonder Years. We thrill at the thought of encounters with the opposite sex, of starting college, of leaving home. We run toward those opportunities, and yet we feel pain leaving behind the friendships of our childhoods. We sense, even without having yet lived long enough to prove it, that we will never have friendships quite like those again.

Seth and Evan have been friends since they were eight years old and are about to be parted when they head to different colleges (Evan to Dartmouth; Seth to a state school, “where the girls are half as smart and thus twice as likely to felat me”). This impending Significant Parting Of Ways is recognized by everyone except Seth and Evan, who meet the comments of classmates and parents—“I can’t imagine what you’re gonna do without each other next year,” “Are you cutting the cord? What’s gonna happen?”—with overstated nonchalance. As Evan puts it, “We met when we were eight; we were fine before then.”

There are signs of tension between the two best friends—Evan’s growing instinct to be “a good guy” is perceived by Seth as “bailing out”—any time Seth learns that Evan has done something without consulting him (such as getting into Dartmouth or, you know, bringing along a condom and “a little bottle of spermicidal lube” in hopes of a hookup), he panics and lashes out at Evan for abandoning him.

The two are united on this particular day, though, by a common goal: to land girlfriends before the end of high school. Evan likes Becca. Seth likes Jules. Jules is having a party and needs someone to get liquor. Enter Fogell (Christopher Mintz-Plasse), a friend even outcast-ier than Seth and Evan, who announces his plan to purchase a fake I.D. after school. Seth churlishly brings Fogell into the fold for the sake of the plan and tells Jules he can get her liquor while Evan tells Becca he can get her liquor (Goldslick vodka).

The stage is set.

The plot of Superbad is fairly familiar. The three friends set out to accomplish a simple series of tasks: use the fake I.D. to get the liquor, take the liquor to the party, get the girls drunk, hook up with the girls, have girlfriends for the summer. Of course the plan is derailed, over and over again. Fogell ends up joyriding with two of the worst cops in the history of the world (Seth Rogan, who co-wrote the film, and Bill Hader) who know him only as McLovin – the name on his fake I.D. Seth and Evan, meanwhile, end up at the sketchiest party in the history of the world.

By the time the three reunite and make it to Jules’s house, with the booze supply shockingly intact, McLovin has built up some street cred and Seth and Evan have suffered the friendship meltdown we all knew was coming. Evan has been reluctantly following Seth’s dubious plans throughout the film, and, presumably, their shared childhood. When he finally puts his foot down, Seth views it as a denial of their friendship. It’s an interesting problem—how to go your own way without putting down someone you love—and one that’s seldom addressed in teen booze-sex-party movies.

In any case, Jules’ party ends in disaster for both boys. Seth gets drunk and passes out in front of Jules, giving her a black eye in the process. Evan and Becca, who had been drinking all night in anticipation of his arrival, endures the most agonizingly awkward hook up ever captured on film. (The hyperbole is deliberate.)

Seth and Evan finally reconcile when Seth rescues Evan from the police raid on Jules’s party. Seth carries Evan away from the scene, across town. When Evan awakes, they walk to his house for a sleepover. There, safe in Evan’s basement, wrapped in their separate sleeping bags, with a plate of pizza bagels on the floor next to them, they declare their love for each other. And then they pass out.

As Superbad unfolds, I find myself letting go of that little stressful feeling I usually get when watching these teen-comedy-romp types of movies. I don’t particularly enjoy watching kids make bad decisions and succumbing to peer pressure and taking risks for things that aren’t worth it. It’s tiring to me – Risky Business, Adventures in Babysitting, Don’t Tell Mom The Babysitter’s Dead (okay, I love that one), I could go on. We all know it will turn out alright in the end, so what’s the point?

In Superbad, though, the revisited plotline is enriched by two things. First, the kids are funny. I think I laugh more constantly through the course of this movie than any other. The laughs just don’t stop. Second, the kids really love each other. Seth and Evan, for all their bickering and, perhaps, inevitably diverging paths, have been best friends forever. They come across not just as archetypal Teenage Dudes, but as actual friends.

At this point, Judd Apatow’s name on a film means to me that that film will have heart. And Superbad is a winning example of that rule. The boys in the film, while crude, do indeed have feelings. The girls, while at times misguided, are smart, specific, and open minded. The details are rich: the pizza bagels, the world-weary home-ec teacher, the eight-year-old references thrown around by kids who’ve been in school together forever, the after-school jobs, the dad’s closet, the constant insults, the slurpies. We all get it. And at the center of all the chaos is something most of us can relate to: that difficult time when we have to learn how to balance our friendships with our larger lives – romantic and otherwise. It’s a bittersweet time, and not all childhood friendships survive it.

Here’s to Seth and Evan. And McLovin. Best wishes.