Tied for the best movie I have ever seen

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.

This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

Jon Lovitz uses his clueless schmuck persona to play a new teacher at the prototypical inner city school, where violence and disorder are the order of the day. The film is a parody of all the idealistic-teacher-saves-the-bad-kids movies. Part of the fun is to identify the film references as they occur, so I will not list them here. Actually, this film also contains references to many other (mostly teen) movies.Don't expect Bergman or Scorcese. The humor is low brow and the sight gags are predictable. But the film is playful. And its predictability is part of the fun, as it recreates iconic moments in teen films and gives them a silly twist.If you like "Airplane", this film may be for you. If you prefer "The Seventh Seal", you don't know who Jon Lovitz is, do you?

Richard Clark (Jon Lovitz- of SNL fame) is a bumbling, caring and out of touch prep school teacher who feels like he should be doing more. He leaves his prestigious position as head of his department for Marion Barry High School, a fictional crime riddled inner city haven for the worst of the worst. Richard aims to help students get a better life out of their rough neighborhoods, but with hilarious results. Along the way Richard has help with class from secretar- err...I mean administrative assistant Victoria Chapel (Tia Carrera- Wayne's World, True Lies) and former thug turned good guy Griff (Mekhi Phiffer- 8 Mile) to help Marion Barry be the best or quite possibly the best...umm maybe.

It wasn't until fairly recently when I first knew this 1996 comedy existed. It's a parody of movies about teachers who get jobs at corrupt schools and try to make a difference. I was only ten years old when this came out, and it's a PG-13 rated film. When I first came across a copy of it in the video store over a decade later, I saw that the lead role was played by Jon Lovitz, a comedian I was familiar with. The film was also written by David Zucker, Robert LoCash, and Pat Proft, and I had previously seen comedies which they were involved in. Before seeing "High School High", I knew it wasn't a very popular spoof movie, but there was still a chance I could find laughs in it, especially with Lovitz in the starring role, and I did. However, unsurprisingly, most of these laughs were small ones, and in the end, I was not left very pleased by the movie.Richard Clark is a teacher who leaves Wellington Academy with another teaching job waiting for him at Marion Barry High School. Unfortunately, he quickly learns that working here will not be a pleasant experience, as this is a very dangerous school full of crime, where the students in general are deeply troubled and constantly get poor marks, and it doesn't look like they have a bright future ahead of them. After arriving at the school on his first day, Clark soon meets the hotheaded principal, Evelyn Doyle, and his first conversation with her turns out to be an embarrassing one, but he then meets an administrative assistant named Victoria Chapell, and falls in love with her. Despite how much trouble Clark's class puts him through, he remains determined to somehow guide them in a different direction, and has his new girlfriend to help him, but obviously, he's going to face more than one problem along the way!Around the time I started watching this high school movie spoof, I certainly wasn't always keeping a straight face, but it didn't exactly look that promising. The first part that made me laugh fully might have been the protagonist, on his first day teaching at Marion Barry High, getting rivals to shake hands in the hall, and unfortunately, not too many gags made me laugh that hard after that. There are some fairly unimpressive sight gags and I didn't really like most of the characters. There certainly were a number of scenes that made me at least smile or laugh just a little, which may not have been the case without a talented comedian like Jon Lovitz in the starring role, and eventually found at least one touching moment. For this, I feel I COULD be giving "High School High" a 6/10 instead of a 5, but definitely no higher than that. I won't advise people to avoid this movie at all costs, but can understand why it doesn't even come close to having the same kind of reputation as "Airplane!" and "The Naked Gun".

Jon Lovitz is possibly the most under-rated Saturday Night Live alumnus. While Mike Myers, Adam Sandler and others have gone on to bigger things, Lovitz has primarily been background fodder for the other ex-cast members. And he's good at this, but he's also good on his own - as this movie proves. High School High was the best school movie parody of its time (before "Not Another Teen Movie"), taking "Dangerous Minds" and making a plot we should actually care about and enjoy. And we also have Tia Carrera (not to be confused with Asia Carrera).Lovitz plays a history teacher who wants to turn a school full of unwanted students into a fleet of tomorrow's best and brightest. With help from his street smarts and an intense chicken race scene, he might just accomplish his goals. But, oh no, what happens when a rival gang steals the tests or the class valedictorian turns to dealing drugs? You're just going to have to watch and see. Recommended (unless you don't like Lovitz, but then you have no sense of humor anyway).