VIDEO: MOVIES: REVIEW: National Lampoon presents Dorm Daze 1 (2003)

Clio: 3.4/5 stars, 7/10.
Carolyn: 4/5 stars, 8/10.
Native ratings: 2.8/5 stars Netflix, only 4.4/10 IMDB.

A crazy dorm caper full of convoluted misunderstandings and plots. It actually reminded us of The Pink Panther 1 (1963) … Except that we liked it (and consider the 1963 Pink Panther movie to be the worst of all 11 Pink Panther films).

It started out with a rushed intro of the characters that felt like it wasn’t going to be that good, but then it started getting better and better.. And it never let up on the comedy or the twists.

Nothing was super sophisticated, but there’s one important thing to note: This is NOT a National Lampoon college-aged sex comedy. This is actually more of a “chase the money” caper. Closer to Pink Panther than American Pie. It was a bit of a surprise.

Yes. A surprising amount of people from Can’t Hardly Wait and Detroit Rock City – 2 of our favorite comedy movies.

James DeBello (Trip in Detroit Rock City, which we JUST watched, Cabin Fever, Scary Movie 2) as Cliff Richards.
Tatyana Ali (Jawbreaker, Ashley Banks in The Fresh Prince Of Bel Air) as Claire.
Tony Denman (Fargo) as Newmar.
Danielle Fishel (Boy Meets World) as Marla.
Courtney Gains (Back To The Future, Can’t Buy Me Love, Children Of The Corn) as Lorenzo the Black Hand (the bad guy).
Edwin Hodge (Take Me Home Tonight, which we JUST watched) as Tony.
Jennifer Lyons (Can’t Hardly Wait, which we JUST watched) as Lynne.
Chris Owen (klepto kid in Can’t Hardly Wait, which we JUST watched, Sherman from The American Pie movies, suicidal freshman in Van Wilder, A Midsummer’s Night Rave) as Booker McFee.

LINK URL: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0362511/combined