Movie is relatable to actual college life

Miller (Miles Teller) and Casey (Skylar Astin) decide to head to their friend Jeff Chang’s (Justin Chon) place and surprise him on his 21st birthday by taking him out to get him completely hammered. The downside is that Jeff has an interview for medical school the following day and is supposed to be up at 7 a.m. for his overbearing father.

Luckily they talk Jeff into going out, but sadly they end up losing control of their friend and his non-stop drinking. Although they do manage to gain control of him later, they can’t remember where he lives. They spend all night trying to find Jeff’s house and get him safely home in time for his interview before his father finds out what they have been up to all night.

I went in feeling very wary of seeing “21 and Over,” mainly because there are very few recent movies about college life that are actually funny (the last really good one, in my opinion, being “American Pie 2”).

What I can say, however, is that “21 and Over” completely exceeded my expectations.

One of my personal pet peeves is when the people in the main cast of a movie are supposed to be a certain age, but the actors themselves are not actually the age that they are supposed to be portraying (Ex: the main characters in “Easy A” were supposed to be in high school, yet they all looked like they were in their mid to late 20s.). In “21 and Over” all of the actors (whether they are or not) look their age.

The best way to describe “21 and Over” is that it feels like a sequel to “Superbad.” The two characters Miller and Casey have separated after high school and reunite later to have another crazy night together. The crazy night that they have could also be compared to the night that the wolfpack had in “The Hangover,” which is no surprise considering the movie was penned by the same writers.

One of the nicer aspects of “21 and Over” is that it gets right into the movie. The characters have their first drink 15 minutes into the movie. Even though it gives very little introduction, you learn more about the guys and their relationships throughout the movie than at the beginning.

The best part about the movie is how relatable it can be to college life. If you have ever gone out drinking with your group of friends (if you’re over 21) and had a great night during which at least one person in the group got too drunk, then there are at least some parts of this movie that you should be able to relate to.

If you see this movie with friends, I strongly recommend that you see it with the people you go out with on the weekends.

My only issues with “21 and Over” are that they are at some party throughout the entire movie and that people party all night. Also, it is hard to grasp the fact that there are that many parties going on all over that campus and that everyone is at the party that the main characters wind up crashing. It is a fun comedy college movie and I guess that part can be expected, so I can forgive most of that.

Even though it is a fun college drinking movie, it does have a bit of a touching storyline, as the friends reconnect even though their separate lives have driven them apart. I think everyone can relate to losing a high school friend once they go their separate ways after high school.

“21 and Over” will have you laughing out loud all throughout the movie. I give “21 and Over” a 4 and a half stars out of 5.