Girls’ Rules (2020)

Directed by Mike Elliott. Starring Madison Pettis, Lizze Broadway, Darren Barnet, Piper Curda, Natasha Benham, Sara Rue, Ed Quinn, Zachary Gordon, Zayne Emory, Camaron Engels, Christian Valderrama. [R]

Just when you thought it was safe to go back to…um, wherever it is people buy DVD’s these days….here comes yet another woeful, scarcely-connected straight-to-DVD American Pie spinoff movie. It’s not much more than a gender-reversal of the first Pie—the misadventures of four sex-obsessed female friends leading up to prom—although it’s not so much about a pact to get laid before the end of senior year (a couple of the gals are already sexually experienced) as it is about all of them going after the same guy, the new kid in school (Barnet). Tamer and more sincere than its lewd, crude brethren, even coming close to actual “character development” at a few junctures, but it’s a strategic error for the producers to hold back on the outrageous stuff as soon as estrogen takes over; anyone with two functioning brain cells can tell you that the ladies can be just as filthy as the fellas. It’s the least painful of the spinoffs, but it earns hardly any chuckles, and nothing in the screenplay or performances comes close to revitalizing the stale format. No Eugene Levy in sight, but Broadway plays another in a long line of “Stifler cousins,” so that’s apparently good enough for the name recognition (it’s also known as American Pie Presents: Girls’ Rules). Barry Bostwick of Rocky Horror Picture Show and Megaforce fame gets an “Introducing” credit (?) for a cameo; Danny Trejo also makes a brief appearance.

30/100