Not Another Teen Movie (2001)

Not Another Teen Movie arrived in cinemas in December 2001, slotting neatly into a brief but busy period when Hollywood had rediscovered a taste for the spoof format. The film takes direct aim at the teen comedies and dramas that had dominated multiplexes throughout the 1980s and 1990s, with John Hughes productions (the school in the film is, pointedly, named John Hughes High) and their various imitators providing the primary targets. The premise is a riff on the makeover bet storyline familiar from films like She's All That, itself a reworking of Pygmalion by way of suburban America. A high school football hero wagers that he can transform the school's overlooked, bespectacled outsider into prom queen material, and almost every other teen movie convention gets dragged in alongside it. The timing of the film's release was not accidental. Scary Movie had landed in 2000 to considerable commercial success, and studios were quickly keen to replicate that model across other genres. Not Another Teen Movie was Columbia Pictures' bid to do exactly that for the teen film cycle specifically, produced under the Neal H. Moritz and Original Film banners, with Moritz himself having produced a string of high-profile studio pictures through this period.

Joel Gallen directed the film, coming primarily from a television background in comedy and music, most notably as a producer and director of MTV and award ceremony broadcasts. Not Another Teen Movie represented his feature debut, and it is a polished but unremarkable piece of studio craft, functional and energetic where it needs to be without ever suggesting a particularly distinct directorial personality. The script was written by several hands, reflecting the kind of collaborative, sketch-by-sketch approach that spoof films of this era tended to favour. The film keeps its runtime tight at 89 minutes, which, given the nature of the material, was probably wise. As for the cast, this is in many ways the film's most interesting footnote from a present-day perspective. Chris Evans, still years away from putting on the shield for Marvel, appears here as the impossibly chiselled jock at the centre of the bet, playing the role with a broad, game comic energy. Chyler Leigh leads opposite him, with Jaime Pressly, Eric Christian Olsen and Mia Kirshner filling out the principal ensemble. None of them were especially established names at the time, though Evans in particular would, of course, go on to rather bigger things. If you have enjoyed other comedies on this site, there are a couple of worth-your-time contrasts: my look at Trolls covers another comedy aimed squarely at a broad audience, and Little by Little offers a very different vintage of the form.

It is also worth noting where Not Another Teen Movie sits in the wider landscape of early 2000s studio comedy, a period that produced some genuinely sharp work alongside a fair amount of product that was funny in isolated moments but struggled to hold together as a whole. For other 2000s films reviewed here, Yi Yi and A Bittersweet Life demonstrate just how varied that decade's cinema actually was. With all that in mind, here is what Macca made of it.

Not Another Teen Movie (2001) is a gleefully absurd spoof that knows the teen movie playbook inside and out, and proceeds to mock every cliché with exaggerated glee. From over-the-top prom scenes to impossible popularity hierarchies, from the “ugly girl makeover” to sports teams winning against all odds, it throws every high school trope into a blender and hits puree. There are genuinely funny moments that land with sharp, satirical timing. The cast leans hard into the silliness, with Chris Evans (yes, that Captain America) stealing scenes as the impossibly perfect jock. The humour is dumb, often juvenile, but self-aware enough to work in bursts. That said, it’s just an average spoof, funny in places, but stretched too thin to sustain its runtime. Once you get the joke (which happens fast), it just repeats variations on the same gag. The plot barely exists. The characters are walking punchlines. And while it’s clearly inspired by Scary Movie, it lacks that film’s relentless energy and shock value. Entertaining if you’re in the mood for mindless laughs, but forgettable once it’s over. Not another classic. Just another comedy. But hey, it delivers what it promises: dumb fun with a wink.

That last line in particular sums it up for me rather well: it delivers exactly what it says on the tin, no more, no less. I think what keeps it from being a genuinely good spoof rather than just a passable one is that it never quite commits to a second gear. Scary Movie works because it accelerates into increasingly chaotic territory; this one settles into a comfortable cruise and stays there. Evans is clearly having a brilliant time, and there are individual gags that make you laugh out loud, but laughter in bursts is not the same as a film that sustains itself. Worth an evening if your expectations are correctly calibrated, less worth a revisit once those expectations have been met. A film that peaks about twenty minutes in and then very cheerfully jogs along beside that peak for the remainder.

Rating: ★★½  | Year: 2001  | Watched: 2025-10-21

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Trailer

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Related on Movies With Macca

More from the 2000s: Kirikou and the Wild Beasts (2005) · Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy (2004) · Daredevil (2003) · Apocalypto (2006)
More comedy: The Eagle (1925) · The General (1926) · Americana (2023) · The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! (1988)