The 90s party movie that drinks like an 80s party movie.
This was one of the last big shabangs for the teen party movie before American Pie turned the dial towards post-Farrelly shock and raunch.
Can’t Hardly Wait is the sort of movie we might have expected John Hughes to still be making in 1998 – one night, one party, everyone figures something out by dawn. But that felt almost quaint by the mid-90s Clueless era, so film makers split the difference: it gave a damn about its characters while being smart enough to mock its own clichés.
The cast is a signed yearbook of pre-fame faces. If you squint, you’ll spot Jason Segel, Clea DuVall, Leslie Grossman, Donald Faison, Tamala Jones, with Laur,en Ambrose as the voice of the i’m so-over-this 90s, Seth Green doing a spot-on wigger chic that wasn’t completely offensive yet, Jennifer Love Hewitt at peak teen queen status, Ethan Embry as the wide-eyed sensitive soul, Jenna Elfman is Wolfman Jack (or Stan Lee, depending on your penchant for American Graffiti or Mallrats). And yeah, Charlie Korsmo (the kid from Dick Tracy and Hook) giving the classic nerd a swan song in his last role before disappearing into law school… and reality.
GN’R’s Paradise City is the undisputed MVP, but the soundtrack constantly makes sure you’re aware that it’s 1998 – Third Eye Blind, Smash Mouth, Eve 6. Songs that were engineered in a lab to trigger millennial nostalgia twenty-five years later. Here we are.
“It ain’t no joke, I’d like to buy the world a…” Just finish the line.
The thing about Can’t Hardly Wait is it loves these characters while knowing they’re archetypes, believes in the magic of one perfect night while acknowledging that most party epiphanies dissolve by morning. Even if you’re Mike Dexter staring your own dead-end in the face.
So yeah, I’m still talking about this movie that nobody particularly loved at the time. Because it landed right before teen movies moved back into mom and dad’s Porky’s-themed basement to get high. But I was there, in an empty theater in June of ’98, and I had a blast.
It’s comfort food cinema. Not particularly nutritious, but sometimes you just need to eat a whole bag and worry about it later. -Pop
-Pop
