September 1st, 1998
Jamie and Patrick are looking dope. Collars? Popped. Jean short? Tight. Coca-cola? Ice cold. It’s nearing the end of middle school and they are grabbing onto one last taste of childhood. Their dad had one word of advice for them on the eve of this momentous year: “Try to watch less bad things, perhaps.” With that he swept his arm in the general direction of the beach and called it ‘nature’s movie.’ Despite this being wrong (Nature’s movie is Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls, obviously) they ventured forth and found themselves feeling the sand between their toes and the rays hitting their chest. As a couple of sweet babes walk by they lower their shades and do a patented Twin Double Take, a.k.a. The Quadruple Take. Suddenly they feel a hand on their shoulder. “You guys checking out our babes?” A couple of beefy high school bros asks them. His tone suggests they shouldn’t answer truthfully. They explain that they were simply checking out their swimsuits since they believe they would look great on their girlfriends. They assure them that they will buy said swimsuits for the next time they are in the Niagara Falls area, but this doesn’t fool the beefy bros and Jamie and Patrick find themselves upside down in a trash can. “We can’t abide this!” Jamie says, slamming his tiny fists with a metal clang. The beefy bros’ mistake was insulting their very real girlfriends who happen to live in Niagara Falls. “Time to get even and schoolz these foolz,” Jamie says, pulling out a very cool phrase he coined. With that their eyes glaze over and they enter a patented Twin Memory in order to recall the last time they had to pound some high school fiends. That’s right! We are back in the saddle of the Daddio cycle for High School High. It’s a Dangerous Minds style parody film starring Jon Lovitz that aired on TV on September 1st, 1999. I recall seeing it as a kid, but don’t remember much about it. It aired the same day as the Michael Dudikoff film Soldier Boyz. It’s a film that I honestly can’t believe is real. Let’s go!
High School High (1996) – BMeTric: 40.1; Notability: 48
StreetCreditReport.com – BMeTric: top 12.0%; Notability: top 7.2%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 19.7%; Higher BMeT: Barb Wire, Kazaam, Striptease, Bio-Dome, The Island of Dr. Moreau, The Crow: City of Angels, Ed, Hellraiser: Bloodline, The Stupids, Spy Hard, Mr. Wrong, Poison Ivy II, D3: The Mighty Ducks, Solo, The Glimmer Man, First Kid, Eddie, Chain Reaction, Dunston Checks In, Maximum Risk, and 10 more; Higher Notability: The Fan, Jingle All the Way, Spy Hard, Chain Reaction, Daylight, Up Close & Personal, Mulholland Falls, Eddie, The Associate, Dear God, Eye for an Eye, Sgt. Bilko, The Island of Dr. Moreau, The Crow: City of Angels, The Adventures of Pinocchio, Space Truckers, Larger Than Life, Girl 6; Lower RT: The Dentist, Big Bully, Ripe, Bio-Dome, Kazaam, Ed, Faithful, Mr. Wrong, Spy Hard, Eye for an Eye, Bulletproof, Solo, Celtic Pride, Curdled, House Arrest, The Glimmer Man, The Crow: City of Angels, In Love and War, Larger Than Life, Down Periscope, and 26 more; Notes: Played 38 times, premiering on December 5th, primetime on Showtime. Some oddities: Spy Hard played 0 times on television despite coming out in 1996, that seems odd, but I’m 99% this is true. Daylight also played once, but that makes more sense since they were holding big films for rental by that point.
RogerEbert.com – 1.5 stars – High School High” opens with a big laugh (“Produced by the producer formerly known as David Zucker”) and goes downhill. Zucker, associated with the “Naked Gun” movies, wants to do the same thing here for the urban high school genre, but the movie makes two mistakes: (1) It isn’t very funny, and (2) it makes the crucial error of taking its story seriously and angling for a happy ending.
(Oh … was that the big laugh? The first third of the film is decent. Not funny, but pretty amusing at times, and Lovtiz I think is a surprisingly good leading comedy actor. The second part makes sense though, I do mostly remember it getting pretty earnest in the end.)
Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4ZUi1mEbG0/
(Ha the Dangerous Minds start is great. I remember this trailer so well. It feels like it should be funny. But it also feels like it is going to be super duper racist.)
Directors – Hart Bochner – ( Known For: PCU; Just Add Water; BMT: High School High; Notes: He appears to have become an actor almost exclusively after this, including ten episodes of The Starter Wife. He was Ellis in Die Hard, who I think was the coke guy, which is hilarious.)
Writers – David Zucker – ( Known For: Airplane!; The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!; Top Secret!; Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult; The Naked Gun 2½: The Smell of Fear; BASEketball; The Kentucky Fried Movie; Future BMT: An American Carol; BMT: Scary Movie V; High School High; Notes: He’s tried a few spoof films more recently and they don’t really work (I’m looking at you American Carol). It seems like his career got sidelined a bit when he started to explicitly work on Republican ads.)
Robert LoCash – ( Known For: Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult; BASEketball; CB4; Bad Girls from Valley High; BMT: High School High; Notes: He wrote a bunch of the Zucker spoofs. He also wrote the iOS game The Naked Gun: I.C.U.P. which is maybe intriguing, although I assume it is basically lost to time at this point.)
Pat Proft – ( Known For: Real Genius; The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!; Hot Shots!; Bachelor Party; Hot Shots! Part Deux; Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult; The Naked Gun 2½: The Smell of Fear; Police Academy 3: Back in Training; Police Academy: Mission to Moscow; Moving Violations; Brain Donors; Lucky Stiff; Future BMT: Scary Movie 3; Scary Movie 4; Wrongfully Accused; Mr. Magoo; BMT: Police Academy; Police Academy 2: Their First Assignment; Police Academy 4: Citizens on Patrol; Scary Movie V; Police Academy 5: Assignment: Miami Beach; Police Academy 6: City Under Siege; High School High; Notes: The rumor was Zucker and him were going to make a new Naked Gun, although I wonder if that was right around when Scary Movie V was released and the fact that that was a huge catastrophe basically stopped that from happening.)
Actors – Jon Lovitz – ( Known For: Matilda; A League of Their Own; Big; The Wedding Singer; Happiness; Three Amigos!; Hotel Transylvania; Rat Race; Hotel Transylvania 2; The Producers; Southland Tales; Cats & Dogs; The Brave Little Toaster; I Could Never Be Your Woman; Sandy Wexler; An American Tail: Fievel Goes West; Extinct; Small Time Crooks; Hamburger: The Motion Picture; Casino Jack; Future BMT: Coneheads; The Stepford Wives; Loaded Weapon 1; My Stepmother Is an Alien; Jumpin’ Jack Flash; Dickie Roberts: Former Child Star; Mr. Destiny; Eight Crazy Nights; Mom and Dad Save the World; Trapped in Paradise; City Slickers II: The Legend of Curly’s Gold; BMT: Grown Ups 2; Little Nicky; The Ridiculous 6; Mother’s Day; The Benchwarmers; North; 3000 Miles to Graceland; High School High; Lost & Found; Notes: Obviously well known for his years on SNL, and also for voicing The Critic. What I know of him now he basically has his comedy club in L.A. and does stuff there. Nominated for two Emmys as part of SNL.)
Tia Carrere – ( Known For: True Lies; Lilo & Stitch; Wayne’s World; Wayne’s World 2; Showdown in Little Tokyo; Easter Sunday; You May Not Kiss the Bride; Wild Cherry; My Teacher’s Wife; Hard Breakers; Zombie Nightmare; Showdown in Manila; The Immortals; Gutshot Straight; Merlin: The Return; Aloha Summer; Top of the World; Hollow Point; Back in the Day; The Legend of Hallowaiian; Future BMT: Harley Davidson and the Marlboro Man; Jury Duty; Kull the Conqueror; BMT: Rising Sun; High School High; Notes: Mostly a television actress now. She was discovered in a grocery store in Hawaii. Sang on the soundtrack of Wayne’s World.)
Louise Fletcher – ( Known For: One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest; Cruel Intentions; Exorcist II: The Heretic; The Player; Two Moon Junction; 2 Days in the Valley; Blue Steel; Brainstorm; Grizzly II: Revenge; The Cheap Detective; Thieves Like Us; The Lady in Red; Strange Invaders; A Map of the World; Return to Two Moon Junction; Big Eden; Strange Behavior; A Gathering of Eagles; Cassadaga; The Last Sin Eater; Future BMT: Flowers in the Attic; Mulholland Falls; Invaders from Mars; Best of the Best; Gone Fishin’; BMT: Virtuosity; Firestarter; On Deadly Ground; High School High; Notes: Won the Oscar for One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. She died in 2022. I’ll let you get into her personal life “controversies” if you want, they seem mild by today’s standards.)
Budget/Gross – N/A / Domestic: $21,302,121 (Worldwide: $21,302,121)
(That isn’t bad, but probably wasn’t actually considered good at the time for an SNL alum. Sandler was already hitting decent numbers at this point. Still, most than I would have expected.)
Rotten Tomatoes – 19% (3/16)
(Oh good a consensus: A one-joke movie, and that joke isn’t very funny anyways. That about sums it up.)
NY Times Short Review: Senseless plot, blunderbuss comedy.
Poster – High School Sigh
(Oooooohhhhhh boy. I gotta give that an F out of principle. My word.)
Tagline(s) – There’s a new teacha in the hood! (F)
(Nope. No. Not a chance.)
Keyword(s) – daddio
Top 10: The Shawshank Redemption (1994), The Godfather (1972), Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989), Back to the Future Part II (1989), Dead Poets Society (1989), Citizen Kane (1941), Platoon (1986), The Game (1997), Dumb and Dumber (1994), O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000)
Future BMT: 78.9 Daddy Day Camp (2007), 61.2 Pet Sematary II (1992), 58.9 Jury Duty (1995), 57.4 The NeverEnding Story II: The Next Chapter (1990), 57.0 Ghost Dad (1990), 50.8 Getting Even with Dad (1994), 49.2 My Girl 2 (1994), 47.7 Delta Force 2: The Colombian Connection (1990), 46.4 Daddy Day Care (2003), 44.5 Man of the House (1995), 43.6 The Final Conflict (1981), 41.6 My Baby’s Daddy (2004), 41.5 Speed Zone (1989), 41.0 Iron Eagle (1986), 38.2 My Father the Hero (1994), 37.9 Dracula: Dead and Loving It (1995), 36.9 Desperate Hours (1990), 35.8 Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo (1984), 35.7 I Got the Hook Up (1998), 34.7 Leviathan (1989)
BMT: Speed 2: Cruise Control (1997), Troll 2 (1990), Super Mario Bros. (1993), Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare (1991), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III (1993), Poltergeist III (1988), Cyborg (1989), Shanghai Surprise (1986), Return to the Blue Lagoon (1991), The Lawnmower Man (1992), Arthur 2: On the Rocks (1988), Fire Birds (1990), Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (1989), Virtuosity (1995), Police Academy 2: Their First Assignment (1985), Navy Seals (1990), Rambo III (1988), High School High (1996), Ernest Goes to Jail (1990), Clifford (1994), Man Trouble (1992), Hard to Kill (1990), Universal Soldier (1992), Days of Thunder (1990), No Mercy (1986), The Postman (1997), The Marrying Man (1991), Wild Bill (1995), Hackers (1995), Lock Up (1989), Magic in the Water (1995), The Adventures of Ford Fairlane (1990)
Best Options (Comedy): 78.9 Daddy Day Camp (2007), 58.9 Jury Duty (1995), 57.0 Ghost Dad (1990), 50.8 Getting Even with Dad (1994), 49.2 My Girl 2 (1994), 46.4 Daddy Day Care (2003), 44.5 Man of the House (1995), 41.6 My Baby’s Daddy (2004), 41.5 Speed Zone (1989), 40.0 High School High (1996), 38.2 My Father the Hero (1994), 37.9 Dracula: Dead and Loving It (1995), 35.8 Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo (1984), 35.7 I Got the Hook Up (1998), 34.3 Man’s Best Friend (1993), 34.2 Spring Break (1983), 34.1 Father Hood (1993), 33.3 Drop Dead Fred (1991), 33.3 Mom and Dad Save the World (1992), 33.2 The Jerky Boys (1995), 32.2 It Takes Two (1995), 31.9 High Spirits (1988), 31.2 Arthur and the Invisibles (2006), 30.9 Another You (1991), 30.3 Who’s Harry Crumb? (1989), 29.7 Spaced Invaders (1990), 28.7 About My Father (2023), 28.0 Fools Rush In (1997), 26.1 Airheads (1994), 26.1 Baby’s Day Out (1994), 26.0 Feds (1988), 24.6 A Low Down Dirty Shame (1994), 24.4 A Fine Mess (1986), 24.4 Sibling Rivalry (1990), 23.1 Clean Slate (1994), 22.6 Moonlight and Valentino (1995), 20.1 Art School Confidential (2006), 19.1 Folks! (1992), 18.9 Threesome (1994), 18.8 Moving (1988), 17.8 Brewster’s Millions (1985), 17.3 Hexed (1993), 16.7 Mr. Destiny (1990), 16.0 Opportunity Knocks (1990), 11.6 With Honors (1994), 8.0 Let It Ride (1989)
(Oh … Jury Duty. But no, fine we don’t need to do that won … but like Jury Duty though? Why didn’t we do Jury Duty again? I do love the plot. The 00s films are all “Dad” or “Father” films basically. Just kind of funny in that it is two different plots smushed together.)
Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 18) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Tia Carrere is No. 2 billed in High School High and No. 3 billed in Rising Sun, which also stars Wesley Snipes (No. 2 billed) who is in Demolition Man (No. 2 billed) which also stars Sylvester Stallone (No. 1 billed) who is in The Expendables 3 (No. 1 billed) which also stars Jason Statham (No. 2 billed) who is in In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale (No. 1 billed) which also stars Leelee Sobieski (No. 3 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 1 billed) => (2 + 3) + (2 + 2) + (1 + 1) + (2 + 1) + (3 + 1) = 18. If we were to watch Trapped in Paradise we can get the HoE Number down to 12.
Notes – The film is dedicated to Elisabeth Leustig and Lexie Bigham, both of whom were involved in the movie’s production and died in automobile crashes shortly after filming was completed. Bigham acted in the film, and Leustig was the film’s casting director.
Mekhi Phifer and Malinda Williams, who play love interests in this film, would later marry and have a son together. They divorced in 2003.
The car race (aka “Chicky Run”) between Griff (Mekhi Phifer) and Paco (Guillermo Diaz), where both drivers race to the edge of a cliff, with the first person jumping out of the car is considered the “chicken”, is similar to the race in the legendary film, Rebel Without a Cause (1955). Ironically, actress Natalie Wood who played Judy, the Chicky Run starter in the latter film, is the mother of actress Natasha Gregson Wagner, who played Julie Rubels, the pregnant teenage in Mr. Clark’s classroom, in this movie.
The film is dedicated to Elisabeth Leustig and Lexie Bigham.
Trey Parker turned down the chance to direct this movie even when he was a Hollywood unknown
Bad Movie Twins 