It’s been a while since we’ve had a good stoner comedy and it looks like High School might just be the movie we’ve been missing. It premiered in 2010 at Sundance to great reviews, but it is finally looking at a full theatrical release. The story focuses on a scheme by some students to have everyone in school test positive for pot use so that they can mask their own use and avoid being expelled.
The movie is the first feature from director John Stalberg and it stars Adrien Brody, Michael Chiklis, Curtis Armstrong, Mykelti Williamson, Colin Hanks, Michael Vartan, Yeardley Smith, Luis Chavez, Matt Bush, Sean Marquette, and Adhir Kalyan. ‘High School’ is set for a April, 20th release… you get it? 4/20?…
official Synopsis:
So it’s the end of the school year, and smarmy Principal Gordon (Michael Chiklis) has suddenly instituted a zero-tolerance crusade against his nemesis, the reviled marijuana. A mandatory drug test for all students is to be administered, failure of which will result in immediate expulsion. Normally, this would be of no consequence to straight-arrow valedictorian Henry Burke, except he just tried ganja for the very first time. With his college scholarship hanging in the balance, Burke begrudgingly teams up with charismatic pothead Travis Breaux to do the only thing they can think of to neutralize this threat—get the entire student body stoned.
In his debut feature, director/cowriter John Stalberg Jr. percolates his deliriously manic narrative with sparkling energy and deviant characters, joyously ramming his protagonists deeper and deeper into frenzied chaos. HIGH school paints its slacker wit with lush broad strokes, firmly accomplishing the conclusive stoner fantasia run hilariously amuck.
