1006. Revenge Of The Nerds (1984)

Starring: Anthony Edwards, Robert Carradine, Timothy Busfield

Director: Jeff Kanew

Running Time: 90 mins

Revenge Of The Nerds is an American film about a group of nerdish college freshman who, after being constantly harassed and persecuted by the university’s jock fraternity, take matters into their own hands in order to get even.

This is one of those cult teen movies that’s a bit of good fun, but still more irritating and than it needs to be. There are a few good laughs, and the concept seems entertaining on paper, but in reality, this does turn into a bit of a frustrating comedy that’s rarely easy-going and properly fun to watch.

Basically, this is just Animal House, but a little less raucous. The difference there, however, is that Animal House managed to provide laugh-a-minute gags that weren’t just one long running joke, which is one of the major problems here.

This film uses those running gags far too often, and relies on them far too heavily. Again, initially, they can be funny, like the fact that they’re all nerds, the jocks are idiots, or that there’s a kid in their fraternity, however it drags on for simply far too long.

Despite that, there is undoubtedly some fun to be had in this film. There are some good laughs throughout, and despite the majority of the comedy being either repetitive or irritating, there’s some good slapstick here and there that will give you a chance to laugh.

And although the first half of the story, where the nerds are just being picked on, isn’t particularly interesting, the second half of the plot, where they begin to plot their revenge by joining a fraternity and then attempting to win the homecoming festival, is quite entertaining to watch, even though it’s still not particularly hilarious.

In the end, this is a pretty stupid teen movie, with annoying concepts, comedy and characters, as well as a crazy plot that still isn’t as consistently entertaining as it could be, but it is ultimately a silly enough film to be ultimately fun to watch, so that’s why I’ll give it a 7.1.