There are a lot of college movies out there and a lot of them are hilarious or meaningful, or both. Accepted is one of those that has kind of skated by while some people notice and others let it slip past without trying to understand what the movie is all about. To be fair, it’s a college movie, and that’s about all that needs to be said since there is a formula that goes into these movies that is easy to predict most times. But Accepted does differentiate itself in a way that makes a lot of sense but challenges the logic and order that college is all about. Here are five reasons why Accepted is ridiculous and five reasons why it’s awesome.
10. Ridiculous: The movie is a very stereotypical look at college.
What I mean when saying this is that college has gained a reputation for turning some people half-crazy after all the studying and others feel entitled because they’re given everything they need to succeed and don’t have to do as much. There are plenty of folks that are somewhere between the extremes that college offers, but in a movie, it’s often easy to show the most extreme cases and let everything else exist as a backdrop.
9. Awesome: The stereotypes are rather amusing.
With that being said, the stereotypes that are used in this movie are hilarious since they push the envelope just enough to make it obvious that they’re not entirely realistic but aren’t too far off the mark either. College is typically what a person makes of it, but there are plenty of cases in which people experience higher education in several different ways.
8. Ridiculous: Lizzie is WAY too serious for her age.
Seriously, some kids start their prep for college when they’re still in grade school or junior high, or have parents that are doing this for them. But while some might think this is normal, Lizzie is WAY too dedicated to her professional career for a kid her age. She wants a fake ID so she can vote for crying out loud. How many kids that age are worried about who’s in the White House?
7. Awesome: The idea of creating a college is ambitious but tempting.
Personally, I’d love to start a college, but the fact is that it’s tougher than it would appear in this movie. But it is tempting since the desire to educate others is something that can be infectious among those that have the desire to see others succeed.
6. Ridiculous: The parents are fooled by the ‘school tour’.
How many parents would be taken in by something like this? Seriously, you’re paying ten grand for a semester and you don’t want to see what the place is all about? You don’t do the research? You don’t figure out the history of the school? It’s a bit nitpicky, but it’s one reason why it doesn’t feel that real.
5. Awesome: Bartleby and his friends make good use of a public eyesore.
The decision to take a building that wasn’t being used and make something so positive out of it is something to be impressed by. I do wonder what they did with the dead body that was found in the ceiling, but in the interest of keeping this a comedy and not a horror, it’s probably best not to think about it.
4. Ridiculous: It does kind of paint ADD in a negative light initially.
It’s nothing to get too oversensitive about, but the fact that the student with ADD does come off as a huge stereotype is hard to miss. Thankfully he does manage to calm down near the end, but some folks might get up in arms about this.
3. Awesome: It inspires students to learn and question rather than just listen, copy, and repeat.
It only takes one viewing to see how this movie tries to break the mold of the average college experience and how great it can be if one can make it work. Plus, the idea of having fun with education is a big part of growing up and learning about life that eases one into the transition of adulthood.
2. Ridiculous: Even innovation needs experience to guide it sometimes.
While the curriculum in this movie is pretty cool it’s not that realistic since it would need a lot of guidance and a few professionals to be hired on to make certain that the lessons are following a direction that would allow a student to gain as much as possible from each course. In other words, innovation is great, but it needs guidance to be excellent.
1. Awesome: In the end, it’s about the value of education and the idea that everyone learns at their own pace.
As someone that values education and everything it can bring, this movie is funny and over the top, but it contains one of the best lessons out of any college movie. That lesson of course is that education doesn’t have to break a person, but it does need to keep them informed. It’s one of the better college movies out there, and I’d debate that with anyone.
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