Superbad 2007

J. R. Jones, Chicago Reader: The variety of complications thrown at the three pubescent heroes raises this a cut above most raunchy comedies. Read more

Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune: The comic peaks of Superbad deal in specific characters rather than easily pegged stereotypes. Their most outlandish verbal riffs -- none of which can be quoted -- give the edgiest stuff in Knocked Up a run for its money. Read more

Manohla Dargis, New York Times: Horny is as horny does in the sweetly absurd high school comedy Superbad. Read more

David Edelstein, New York Magazine/Vulture: Superbad might be the most provocative teen sex comedy ever made; it is certainly one of the most convulsively funny. Read more

Joanne Kaufman, Wall Street Journal: What's most memorable, most striking about Superbad is the canny evocation of male friendship in all its richness and complexity. Read more

Mark Rahner, Seattle Times: If you liked the raunchy dude conversations in 40-Year-Old Virgin, you'll think Superbad is the Lawrence of !@#$ Arabia of raunchy (adolescent) dude conversations. Read more

Nathan Rabin, AV Club: Superbad is a funny, boozy, ramshackle party, but it's more likely to leave audiences with a tingly afterglow than a pounding hangover. Read more

Wesley Morris, Boston Globe: I wanted to find this as funny as audiences did. But it mostly made me understand the case for staying a virgin until you're 40. Read more

Carina Chocano, Los Angeles Times: I hope it's not damning the movie with the wrong kind of praise to say that for a film so deliriously smutty, Superbad is supercute. Read more

Amy Biancolli, Houston Chronicle: Even this middle-age hausfrau can appreciate the zonkered comic force behind Superbad, whose rambling plot and profane bull sessions reminded me of Danny Leiner's Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle. Read more

Tom Charity, CNN.com: This is the funniest picture since Borat, and more emotionally nuanced than you would expect. Read more

Lisa Kennedy, Denver Post: A critical mass of these kinds of flicks argues for a new subgenre: "nerdsploitation." Read more

Adam Graham, Detroit News: Superbad falls short of teen classic status. What a super-shame. Read more

Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly: Superbad is cute if you like guys who aren't even remotely bad, in a coming-of-age tale so old-fashioned the girls might just as well be wearing bloomers. Read more

Christy Lemire, Associated Press: We'll just say that McLovin turns out to be the baddest mutha by far. Read more

Terry Lawson, Detroit Free Press: The unrelenting Judd Apatow stamp on movie comedy continues with Superbad, which is recognizably in the same hilariously vulgar vein. Read more

Liam Lacey, Globe and Mail: The writers shoot often and copiously, and they're obviously in love with their ability. Now, if they could just get some sort of focused, confident rhythm going, they might make things more satisfying for the audience as well. Read more

Chris Vognar, Dallas Morning News: Superbad has raunchy charm, a fair amount of heart and a couple of nice performances. Read more

Gene Seymour, Newsday: This is pure 'situation comedy' in which the humor and the poignancy emerge from the situations rather than being imposed upon your senses. The bar for teen sex comedies in America has finally been raised -- and not a moment too soon. Read more

David Denby, New Yorker: The movie succeeds as a teen's wild fantasy of a night in which everything goes wrong, revised by an adult's melancholy sense that nothing was ever meant to go right. Read more

Lisa Rose, Newark Star-Ledger: ...there are some classic scenes and the cast is hilarious. Read more

Bob Mondello, NPR.org: What makes the film so appealing is the disconnect between what comes from the mouths of these hormone-addled pups and what's going on in their heads, where they're still clinging desperately to the innocence they're leaving behind. Read more

Jack Mathews, New York Daily News: This hormonal answer to Reefer Madness is good, wacked-out fun. Read more

Linda Stasi, New York Post: Super-vulgar, ridiculously sophomoric, horribly nasty and so hilarious you'll probably squirt Diet Coke out of your nose within the first 20 minutes. Read more

Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel: Like Knocked Up, this is a comedy they don't know how to end. The energy flags as it overstays its welcome. Read more

Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer: A crazed odyssey of booze, lust, thwarted sex and undying friendship. Read more

James Berardinelli, ReelViews: The movie is frequently amusing and occasionally uproarious. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: A four-letter raunch-a-rama with a heart. Read more

Stephanie Zacharek, Salon.com: The movie doesn't need any superfluous redeeming qualities: Its pleasures and charms lie in its very crudeness, in the way the characters' thoughts begin in their dicks and spill out of their mouths, completely bypassing their brains. Read more

Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle: For pure laughs, for the experience of just sitting in a chair and breaking up every minute or so, Superbad is 2007's most successful comedy. Read more

Dana Stevens, Slate: It's Michael Cera (heretofore best known as Jason Bateman's son on Arrested Development) whose comic timing quietly steals the show. Read more

Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star Tribune: Superbad maintains that delicate balance of sweetness, empathy and vulgar comedy. It's so packed with irreverent lowbrow wit that you scarcely notice how it quietly shifts from gross-out jokes to adult themes. Read more

Joe Williams, St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Even though it takes the low road, this guided tour of Loserville offers as many belly laughs as Knocked Up -- and that's saying a lot. Read more

Geoff Pevere, Toronto Star: Contains laughs galore, so many that the last one may get in the way of next one coming. But it's also got moments where you may want to cover your eyes to shield yourself from the sheer, wince-inducing familiarity of the behaviour on display. Read more

Richard Corliss, TIME Magazine: An avalanche of d--- jokes and strenuous slapstick. Read more

Ben Walters, Time Out: 'Superbad' at its best goes right through knockabout to land in deliciously obscene places - notably a staggering succession of doodles in which tumescent cocks take on various extraordinary guises. Read more

Christopher Orr, The New Republic: [Cera] has some of the best comic timing of anyone working in film today, a precocious sense of the awkward pauses and misread cues in which social panic resides. Read more

Claudia Puig, USA Today: Humiliation, fear and occasional elation are the dominant emotions for these bumbling but oddly likable young men. Side-splitting laughter, along with some powerful cringing, are likely to be audiences' dominant reactions. Read more

Todd McCarthy, Variety: The bawdy jokes score big points, but it's the rueful acknowledgement of adolescent embarrassment and humiliation that most distinguishes Superbad. Read more

Scott Foundas, Village Voice: Superbad is a movie about partying and getting wasted and getting the girl, but as the night wears on, much wisdom is gained too, about self, friendship and the end of teenage innocence in all its wondrous, terrifying splendor. Read more

Ann Hornaday, Washington Post: Greg Mottola executes Superbad with his characteristically light touch, even if it's used in the service of filthy sight gags, endless profanity and an inordinate obsession with bodily fluids. Read more