Customer Reviews

High School High [VHS]

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

This Film Is Not In Widescreen!
If it is please tell me where I can get it.
I Love just about Everything The Zucker Brothers have had a hand in.
From "The Naked Gun" to "Airplane" to the lesser known,
"Brain Donors" & "Top Secret".
This Movie is pretty damn funny, but some of the "Jokes" are totally ruined
by the "Pan & Scan" Version of this movie.
So if you are into this Brand of humour, You will like this dvd,
This review only give lesser stars because the movie isnt in widescreen.
So 4 Stars for the actual movie,
1 Star deducted for being Pan & scan (Scam)

Yes, it is true. Although Amazon.com advertised it as being in both formats, it is only in Full Screen format. I bought it and I have to return it now.
For who wants to know, Columbia House has it in both formats (it came out on the market a few years earlier and they still have it).

Man, you people are harsh. I didnt think this movie was bad at all. Heck, the first time I saw I fell in love with its stupidity. Back when I first saw it, I would've gave a five stars but now its four stars because the movie loses steam after the i hour mark and the jokes start to become hit or miss. But for the first hour this film is a riot.

The plot is that Richard Clark(Jon Lovitz) leaves Wellington Academy to go teach at Marion Barry High School against his father's best wishes. Richard believes that he can make a difference there and on his way he falls for a gorgeous teacher called Victoria Chappell(Tia Carrere).

High School High was a spoof on those troubled high school kids movies like Dangerous Minds, Lean On Me and Stand And Deliver. Unlike the crap that passes for parody(like anything by Seltzer and Friedberg) HSH hits all its targets and actually has a story tied to the spoof. Compare that with spoofs that are just about picking on pop culture and meaningless gags. Jon Lovitz was hysterical and as a comedic actor he never got enough credit. Tia Carrere was gorgeous as well as funny and Louise Fletcher was funny to as the irascible school principal. Mekhi Phifer as well as the supporting cast add to the laughs too. If you can appreciate parodies that arent extremely gross you might like this one. I feel its one of the most underrated spoofs ever produced by the Zucker Brothers. Two thumbs up.

Movies like this don't get much respect but this one is really cute. The plot is nothing special, a predictable comedy formula; Jon Lovitz is a bumbling but good-hearted schlemiel of a teacher in a wild inner city school. But the movie is well written with great jokes and sight gags. At the beginning, Lovitz is teaching in a fancy private school, where the receptionist answers the phone "Are you white?" before she directs the call. The depiction of the mean, arrogant rich boys who study there is painfully accurate. Then he moves to the ghetto school where there is a reserved parking space for the SWAT team. Guards patrol the upper tier of the school auditorium just like a state prison yard. There are many such brilliant touches and Jon Lovitz is loveable as always.

Tia Carrere is as lovely as any Hollywood actress could be. Really a beautiful woman, at least as good an actress as Cameron Diaz, and better than Demi Moore. Don't know why she is always stuck in B space.

Fun to watch or rent - recommended

High School High Is pretty funny and a great parody of the Good Teacher/Bad Student movies coming out,Dangerous Minds being one of them. Jon Lovitz isn't hilarious per Se, Not In the movie or his other work, but the movie isn't awful. Tia Carrere(Waynes World) is in it,she's beautiful, the movie could have been better. It's a silly movie.I give it three and a half to Four Stars.

I love this movie. As a high school teacher with the Los Angeles Unified School District, I can say that much of the student behavior the movie portrays is greatly exaggerated, but that is strictly for humor. For example, the scene where Lovitz drives up in front of the school and a bomb explodes on the second floor and blows out several windows. I find that hilarious, but I doubt that ever occurred in a LAUSD school. Also, Lovitz's jacket completely covered with gum wads thrown by his students is over the top, BUT one semester I had to use a math teacher's room for one period, and I noticed that the top half of the wall in the front of the class was similarly coated with gum wads. I beleive the movie's purpose is to skewer the feel-good teen movies like "Stand and Deliver," which I also enjoy. If you enjoy high-school genre movies, I would also recommend "Lean on Me" (based on a true story), and Dangerous Minds.

I could watch this movie a million times and it would still be equally funny as the first time I watched it. I don't know why someone would give this movie anything other then a 5. It is one of a kind, outrageous and hilarious all at the same time.

Although I go for cheap, chessy comedies too, this movies is NONE of that. The gags are clever and unpredictable, and the acting, especially by Lovitz and Carrere, is superb. Comedy is always hard, especially if one is doing comedy about potentially sensitive issues (e.g. rough high schools). "High School High" succeeds at making one laugh while not offending anyone.

I used to think that John Lovitz was funny (see The Critic and SNL) but after this I felt that he wasn't at all, or he must've been desperate for money. Tia Carrerre did a wonderful job playing an talentless teacher. After such wonderful performances as the bad girl in True Lies, and the naked chick in Rising Sun, I was surprised at how little cleavage she showed in this movie. If you find stupid humor funny, than this movie is for you. Oh, and please wait for things to come out on video if you do like this, because Hollywood producers see the money that terrible unfunny films make and decide to make more of them (like every teen-highschool-angstridden-SarahMicheleGellar-film)

High School High (1996) is a valuable rental, for those looking for
easy laughs and slapstick comedy, addressing a particularly difficult
subject, which is a high school environment, in the inner city, that
appears filmed in some parts of Africa or Bosnia-Herzogovina, after being
subjected to a number of years of turmoil. The walls are crumbling, there is
no law enforcement of any kind, the students somehow are all unfit for basic
tasks, etc.

Faced with this scenario, the character played by Jon Lovitz joins with that
played by Tia Carrere and a student, played by Mekhi Phifer to to turn things around.

There are opposing gangs, such as the one led by the character played by Guillermo Díaz who
thrive on the status quo, and after 90 minutes, the script packs a twist ending, or surprise
while at the same time, managing to be funny enough to maintain the attention spans of viewers.

In sum, a movie that is easily watchable, and funny throughout, but lacks credibility and
at no time, suggests it could be taken for anything than fiction. 1.5 stars.