Our fearless – and quite possibly senseless – movie janitor is watching every movie on the IMDb Bottom 100 list. Join us now for another installment of Unwatchable.
No, this is not a rerun. Unwatchable is back from a brief (but oh so blissful) summer hiatus, and we’ll continue our march up the IMDb’s list of the 100 worst movies ever made next time with #76. But as you may dimly recall, I was forced to skip #88 initially because it had not yet been released on DVD at the time. It was a better world back then, a world in which College Road Trip was not available on video, and I miss it so. But we can’t go back. College Road Trip is now out on DVD, it will always be out on DVD, clogging landfills and supporting drinks on coffee tables, so let’s just get it over with.
If you like your Martin Lawrence movies G-rated – and who doesn’t? – you’re in for a real treat. Lawrence is James Porter, police chief and doting father, two roles he was born to embody I’m sure we all agree. His dream is to send his college-bound daughter Melanie (Raven-Symone) off to Northwestern, a mere 18 minutes from his doorstep, but she has eyes on Georgetown in far-off Washington DC. When two of Melanie’s friends invite her along on a COLLEGE ROAD TRIP, James objects but reluctantly volunteers to drive her himself. Tagging along for the ride are Melanie’s precocious brother Trey and his super-intelligent pet pig Arnold. My guess is that the pig was added to one of the later College Road Trip drafts at the suggestion of a Disney executive concerned about the lack of slapstick involving anthropomorphic animals in the original story. This may have happened before or after another executive suggested the inclusion of a musical interlude in which Raven-Symone performs a teen-pop version of “Double Dutch Bus” on a bus full of Japanese tourists. It is believed that a third executive – the one who insisted that Donny Osmond be cast as the overly cheerful father of another prospective student – is now selling pencils on the Third Street Promenade.
But it would be a mistake to dismiss College Road Trip as a mere collection of mind-numbing pratfalls (including a hee-larious scene in which Lawrence parachutes onto a golf course and knocks fat Vito from The Sopranos into a water hazard). It’s also a collection of saccharine life lessons! Fathers, it’s not a good idea to sneak into the sorority house where your daughter is staying and hide under her bed. In fact, it’s a good way to get tazed. And young ladies, if your dad hides under your bed, that just means he loves you. But not in a creepy way. Really.
Previously on Unwatchable:
77. BloodRayne 2: Deliverance
78. The Quick and the Undead
79. Anus Magillicutty
80. The Smokers
81. Soccer Dog: The Movie