I Love You, Beth Cooper

I Love You, Beth Cooper (2009)
★ / ★★★★
I had a feeling that “I Love You, Beth Cooper,” directed by Chris Columbus, tried to summon those great teen ’80s flicks but instead of being nostalgic, the film fell flat on its face because it ultimately lacked intelligence in its script and its characters. During his speech, the high school valedictorian (Paul Rust), predictably an awkward nerd, decided to declare to the whole school that he loved Beth Cooper (Hayden Panettiere), predictably one of the cheerleaders, from the moment he laid eyes on her through the years when he sad behind her in class (creepy). Along with that declaration, he put the spotlight under the mean girls and mindless jocks and claimed that they were losers and they would remain losers after high school. Naturally, our protagonist and Beth Cooper ended up talking to each other after graduation, got into a number of misadventures and learned that first impressions weren’t always accurate. Just typing all of that made me bored because I’ve seen it all before. There was nothing original about this movie that I can specifically point to and say that I was impressed with. In fact, I was just annoyed with it especially when the lead character’s best friend who happened to be a film geek would make the most random movie references. That character made people like me look bad; just because we’re film buffs (or getting there), it doesn’t mean that we’re going to reference to every single movie that existed every other second, especially to people we just met. It’s just ridiculous and not funny. I think that was this movie’s problem: it tried too hard to impress when it shouldn’t have because the flaws became that much more glaring. Everything was loud and obnoxious especially the jocks who, I must say, had antisocial personalities and needed serious psychological help. Each character was one-dimensional and it was no fun watching the movie because it lacked depth. Teen movies like “Superbad” or “Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist” have proven that substance and comedy don’t have to be mutually exclusive. With movies like “I Love You, Beth Cooper,” obviously I expect certain things like plotlines involving losing one’s virginity, sex jokes and even gay jokes. However, can’t help but love the subgenre because it does have the potential to surprise and even inspire. Unfortunately, “I Love You, Beth Cooper” was a disaster and a total waste of time.












A teen comedy, that really had no intention on doing anything different. Just being the same old, lame, dumb, romantic comedy for teens everywhere.
I had a feeling it was going to be terrible yet I still decided to watch it. I blame myself for losing valuable brain cells.