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Review Uploaded
05/09/03

1 hr. 37 mins.
Starring: Benjamin Fletcher, Nicole and Roxanne Frilot, Brittany Brown-Hart, David Ingber, Jeremy Jazwinski, Amber Madison, Paul Malbry, Marquita “Sky” Marshall, Laura Ramsey, Mattew Slenske, Alan Taylor, Heidi Vance, Jorell Washington, Casey Weeks, Sarah Wilkins; cameos by Snoop Dogg, Hot Action Cop, Simple Plan
Directed by: Rick de Oliveira

Rating: * ½ stars (out of 4 stars)

Hey, who says that there isn’t any kind of useful relevance behind a throwaway society? If you ask a generous segment of the American population who buy into the gimmicky notion that party-hearty college-age cutups make for some rollicking reality-style good times on the big screen, they’d tell you that this same throwaway society has its utopian advantages. After all, there’s something that can be said for the enticing ritual of Spring Break where the celebration is the ultimate form of liberation from the rigors of everyday discipline and responsibility, right? So if your brand of escapist entertainment includes the usual display of uninhibited hard-bodied babes and hunks reveling it up to the temptations of flowing booze and hormonal urges gone haywire then this bouncing boob job of a flick is certainly up your alley.

In director Rick de Oliveira’s mindless and tepid titillating treat The Real Cancun, the stakes aren’t very high based on the gamble of bringing the spontaneity and outrageousness of the reality television craze to the movie theaters. Producers Mary-Ellis Bunim and Jonathan Murray, the main forces behind the long-running MTV staples The Real World and Road Rules, apply their boisterous boob tube formula on celluloid. The set up is familiar so there are no worthy surprises for those that are ardent fans of the Bunim-Murray touch: they manage to randomly gather a bunch of young people together and have them live under peculiar R-rated circumstances as they co-exist manically while being continuously filmed in the process.

What seemed at first like an intriguing concept on the small screen is merely an uneventful regurgitation of something that has obviously worn out its welcome in freshness and unpredictability. If anything, The Real Cancun is an exploitive extension of a ubiquitous phenomenon currently saturating prime time television-the popularity of reality TV. Consequently, it doesn’t translate well on film and one has to wonder why anyone would pay hard-earned money for this frivolous nonsense when in fact they can check out this kind of suggestive foolishness on TV for free in the comfort of their own home? Heck, one could rent the Girls Gone Wild video series if the naughty mood strikes them. If the cinema wants to duplicate the invasion of reality within its own ranks, it’s barking up the wrong tree while using the flaccid Cancun as its ribald trendsetter. This is one tequila shot experiment gone terribly bad.

We are introduced to sixteen volunteers that quickly assume the dubious position as carefree houseguests staying at the comfy and posh Cancun beachfront Baccara Hotel during the exciting Spring Break stretch. Their simple mission: to roam from one wild bash to another while taking in the alcohol-triggered atmosphere that draws them into this seedy realm. And as can be expected there are an assortment of cliché-driven episodes that occur without much forethought such as the obligatory glimpses of wet T-shirt contests, casual sexual encounters, incoherent conversations, concert gatherings where hazy attendees let the music overrule their obnoxiousness and the pseudo-comical showcase of hangovers that unmercifully dictate the preposterous proceedings. Basically these free-wheeling folks are given the green light to make complete fools out of themselves while expecting the audience to buy this arrangement as some off-the-cuff look at the fragile moral makeup of ambivalent youngsters and the hidden angst they may secretly harbor as they’re about to face the real world once the comfort zone known as the college experience subsides.

As one might imagine, we’re subjected to a cast of colorful characters with various personalities and built-in conflicts to match. Among the singled out protagonists are surfer studmuffin Casey, muscle-headed pretty boy Jeremy, seemingly innocent teetotaler Texan farmboy Alan, former gorgeous stripper twins Roxanne and Nicole, “grabby” pals Heidi and David, giddy gal Sara, and token black hangers-on Sky and Paul…just to name a few of the profiled stars in this disjointed reality movie that has all the potency of a watered-down daiquiri. There are strung together elements of both drama and comedy bits that fail to hit their mark occasionally. The choppy editing struggles to keep tabs on the harried goings-on of its participants that one might have trouble trying to digest the fast-paced structure of this otherwise aimless party-going patchwork of a production. Whether you are taken in by the relentless intrigue of watching the inebriated opposite sex trying to land their lusty proposals for doing the nasty under the sheets or marvel at the inane discussions that determine the so-called cattiness of these young people such as contemplating the style of penis one hot-to-trot chick might prefer, this 97-minute cheap thrill is a stilted and juvenile sociological misfire that’s every bit as tedious as it is tacky.

The major disappointment behind the agonizingly weak-kneed expose that is The Real Cancun is the fact that this whole romp has no sense of a compelling story to tell whatsoever. Sure, it places a crew of geared-up attractive young people in an exotic location based in Cancun, Mexico and holds its breath while expecting the cheeky chips to cunningly fall where they may. But this is an absolute waste of lazy filmmaking because all the moviemakers are asking the audience to do is play Peeping Tom to a raucous group of college students who let their hair down to play vigorously. What’s so uniquely dramatic, insightful or droll about having willing college kids gain access to an abundance of liquor as they methodically crash the upbeat clubs along the infamous Hotel Strip? Is this considered somewhat of a daring and irreverent challenge or something? If de Oliveira had bothered to consciously explore the psychology behind why so many students-particularly his specific sixteen being filmed in general-feel so obligated to embrace the clubbing lifestyle as a way of coping with their smothering existence and high collegiate expectations then we could understand a little more the bewildering aspects of what drives these impressionable individuals to engage in the hedonistic happenings that rescue them briefly from their confining realities. Unfortunately, there’s no such dice here as the filmmakers want to foolishly tap into the cheesy tawdriness that made the eighties teen comedy sexcapades so marketable. It definitely would have been interesting to see why this disillusioned gang felt like getting numb through their high caliber carousing instead of being numbing through this overactive giggly ordeal.

The arbitrary nature of this pointless movie being thrown into one rushed rousing piece may in fact prove to be some sort of unconventional high wire act that lends this dud its ridiculously reckless personality but this really isn’t the case. Plain and simple, The Real Cancun is just another vacuous vacuum that sucks up nothing but the vapid trivialities that appeal to the commercial taste of its selected and indiscriminate onlookers who would gladly relinquish their horny tendencies to something so flighty and flimsy as this fruitless fleshy fable.