Eurotrip' seeks continent, chicks

With all the hype about Oscar season’s chokehold on mass media, it is good to see a movie get back to film fundamentals – incessant nudity, boozing, raunchy behavior and punch lines that leave no sex joke unturned. Adhering to the ever-popular genre of teen sex romps, such as “American Pie,” “Eurotrip” – from the same producers of “Old School” and “Road Trip” – takes the same act across the pond, leaving the audience with two options – hating it or loving it. “Eurotrip” focuses on the story of Scott Thomas, played by Scott Mechowicz, the typical loveable boy next door, who is just too nice and predictable. Dumped by his girlfriend Fiona, played by Kristen Kreuk, at his graduation, Thomas is left in shambles as he watches his ex rock out on stage to the song “Scottie Doesn’t Know,” a rip on Thomas for not seeing his ex’s constant infidelities. The rocker and presumably new boyfriend is none other than a punked-out, multiply-pierced, tattooed and bald-headed Matt Damon. As if things couldn’t get any worse, Thomas later finds out that his German pen pal “Mike” is interested in a bit more than casual conversation through e-mail, leading Thomas to cancel any future contacts between the two. Add to this that “Mike” is actually Mieke, a gorgeous German blonde who thinks Thomas is her one and only, and you have the reason for Thomas’s trek to Berlin.Thomas, as in all teen sagas, is joined on his quest by his best friend Cooper, played by Jacob Pitts, who seeks personal liberation from his prudish American upbringing through European sex. Pitts’ sly comedic delivery is a welcome refreshment throughout the movie. Coupled with his looks, this would make him an easy winner for any David Spade look-alike competition, if there were such a thing and if winning was a good thing.The two begin their trip in jolly old England, where a chance meeting in a private pub lands the duo in hot water with diehard Manchester United fans – think soccer hooligans – but luckily, Thomas knows United’s fight song, Sheena Easton’s “Morning Train.” A drunken night leaves Thomas and Cooper on a bus heading to France for a soccer match. As fate would have it, two of their closest high school friends – twins Jenny, played by Michelle Trachtenberg, and Jamie, played by Travis Wester – a trip to Europe, uniting these four forces in one common goal – finding Mieke.Here is where the hilarity begins, because why would you go directly to Berlin, when you have Europe as your playground? In France, Thomas takes part in an epic robot dance-style kung-fu battle with a street performer and the group is chased by hundreds of naked old men when it is discovered that Jenny isn’t just one of the guys on a male-dominated nude beach. Fred Armisen of Saturday Night Live fame, as a creepy Italian guy, joins the group on their train ride through France, and his wandering fingers and tongue seem to target Thomas, Cooper and Jamie.Amsterdam offers the group another dynamic as Cooper is finally sexually liberated at Club Vandersexxx, by a Dutch dominatrix played by Lucy Lawless. In Bratislava, Jenny and Jamie prove they are the worst twins ever, by drunkenly and passionately making out on the dance club floor.In Germany, the group learns that Mieke is actually in Italy, but they also see the possibility of a Fourth Reich, as Mieke’s toddler stepbrother has rather Hitler-like habits. In Italy, Mieke and Thomas finally find each other and consummate their relationship as any couple would after meeting minutes earlier – sex in a Vatican confessional.In the end, the “follow that dream girl” plot is fulfilled when a technical glitch makes Thomas and Mieke roommates at Otterbein College. Everyone lives happily ever after. Basically, if you like nudity, gross-out humor, prodigious one-liners and constant lewd, rude and crude behavior, “Eurotrip” is right up your alley. If not, don’t bother going.Allard can be reached at dallard@campustimes.org.