AMERICAN PIE PRESENTS
BETA HOUSE

"Let the games begin"

After running the Naked Mile, Erik Stifler (White) heads to college and hopes to join his cousin Dwight (Talley) and become a member of the BETA fraternity. As he and his friends Cooze (Siegel) and Booby (Nac) try and complete the pledge tasks, GEK House tries to have BETA House thrown of campus by challenging them to the Olympiad, a series of games that have been banned from the college for forty. The winner would win the house of the loser and banish them from campus forever.

The American Pie franchise continues but should the series have stopped on the big screen and not brought us more direct to DVD specials?

We've had 'Band Camp', 'The Naked Mile' and now 'Beta House', the American Pie series has become a franchise but instead of continuing on with the characters that defined the series on the big screen, the direct to DVD sequels follow the exploits of the Stifler clan and is not as good because of it. With Sean William Scott been a big star and would never appear in a direct to DVD movie, the rest of the Stifler clan have been escalated to stardom. While we had heard of Steve Stifler's little brother Matt for 'Band Camp', 'The Naked Mile' and now 'Beta House' concentrates on their cousins Erik and Dwight Stifler and the movie suffer for this.

The third direct to DVD sequel is basically an 'Animal House' wannabe but it comes nowhere near the National Lampoon classic. Filled with pledge tasks, girls, outrageous bodily fluid gags and of course a rival house that their fraternity shut down and its members thrown off campus, the plot far too inspired by the classic and every other frat movie there has ever been. The lack of originality could have been forgoed by some of the trademark 'American Pie' rude humour but the film just doesn't go as far as the fans might have hoped for.

The performances are also a little lack lustre. John White is still a little too wet to be a Stifler and basically recreates the performance he graced 'The Naked Mile' with. He is far too much like Jim Levenstein, the star of the original movies', than a Stifler. Jake Siegel isn't great as Erik's best friend Cooze because he brings no shock value to the proceedings, even when he thinks the girl he might be dating is a man. All the girls are merely sex objects and there to take their tops off throughout. The only saving grace is the Steve Talley as Dwight Stifler, the head of Beta House and the hero of campus. He quickly takes over as the main character of the piece and provides most of the laughs that the movie has to offer.

'American Pie presents: Beta House' is another direct to DVD sequel that lets the original series down. While Steve Talley's Dwight Stifler captures the essence of the series, everything else is simply not a good slice of American Pie and one that could have been as tasty as it could have been.

PICTURE & SOUND

Presented in Widescreen 1.85:1 Anamorphic with a Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack, the transfer is good.

BONUS FEATURES

None

OVERALL

The complete lack of any extras for 'American Pie Presents: Beta House' is a travesty. A DVD, even a direct-to-DVD sequel, should have some bonus material for fans and the decision not to include anything for this release is a crime. Fans will be very disappointed.

DVD

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2007