a_chinn I'll say up front that this film is really more of a 2 1/2 -star comedy, but it gets an extra half star for pure 1980s nostalgia. In a classic Slobs vs. Snobs comedy set up, with perennial college students Tim Matheson and Stephen Furst and a couple other buddies facing off against other snooty teams (ugh, preppies!) in an intercollegiate rafting race, while also wooing pretty all girl teams, but mostly Jennifer Runyon. Overall, there are a lot better of slobs vs snobs films (i.e. "Animal House," "Revenge of the Nerds," "Caddyshack," or even "DC Cab"), but "Up the Creek" isn't all that bad.
PeterMitchell-506-564364 I love how this movie came together. Also, I can't ever imagine this film existing without Matheson. What we have here is a pleasantly surprising sex comedy like the Porky's, Hotdogs, Screwballs, etc. But this is genuinely good and better. It has a great title rock track. We have these bomb outs, Furst, Helberg, and Porky's Monahan, and Tim Matheson as legendary flunkie Bob Macgraw, who are thrown rewarding offers by their Dean, that's if they win this inter collegiate raft race. Finally persuaded by a little bit of shove, they get their raft in the water, but before the race, there's many laughs let me tell you, like Mcgraw's horny dog, where it's a bitchin' night, or when Matheson and the others woo Furst to get rid of the crap he's eating. He throws it out the window of the four wheel drive, where a poor motor cylist is blinded, lemon meringue pie, etc, and all, where Furst, the only witness, watches him go off the side of a cliff. Matheson then ask's him, "Don't you feel better". But as always in these races, we had adversaries, like another group of college guys, real arse..les, where one of their girlfriends, (beautiful blonde Runyon) has caught him red handed with another chick, he's teeth practically chewing on her bra. She then goes for Matheson, inflaming her ex, so you know this race is gonna be hell of a rocky one, which it is. I love it! An adventure and comedy with a different premise, and a nice scenery that I liked, some raft scenes beautifully shot, the prime one, where the raft goes down a waterfall, the river disrupted by a prior explosion from a gung ho nut, the leader of this military team, where a condo is even taken out, that was in the river's path. That leader, psycho di..head was a great written character attribute, I thought. And of course, each of his dirty stunts backfire, like mistakenly flattening his jeep with a boulder. But too we have the other group of slime buckets, who try and put a pin in Matheson's boy's sails, again and again, where Runyon and her girls end up merging with them and together they lash big at these pigs, where again, good sures evil. Up the Creek rises among many of the other sex comedies, may'be cause of it's originality or gags. But if you haven't seen this one, it was one of the eighties better ones, of his type. After all we have Matheson and the beautiful Runyon, and another bigger waterfall. And to spur the teams into action at the starting line, one girl flashes her t..ties too.
Michael_Elliott Up the Creek (1984) ** (out of 4)Tim Matheson, Dan Monahan, Stephen Furst and Sandy Helberg are the four dumbest students at an overly dumb college. One day the four are brought together by the Dean and offered free Majors if they compete in a white water rafting contest and win it. Soon the four rejects are doing battle against a bunch of preps.Some people say that the films from the 80s are some of the rudest and dumbest of any decade in history. With horror films you had mindless slashers and with comedies the teen sex sub-genre was one of the biggest. Both genres seemed to have new films coming out weekly and if you're a fan of those genres then you know there are some great titles as well as some really bad ones. UP THE CREEK was rather smart as it got cast from both NATIONAL LAMPOON'S ANIMAL HOUSE and PORKY'S and brought them together.So, if the film a winner? I'd say no. I'm not sure what it is but to me this is one of the unfunniest comedies to come out of the teen sex genre. I'm not going to say this is an awful movie because it's slightly entertaining but I've always been shocked at how it held my attention despite containing very few laughs. Whereas most sex comedies went for outrageous and dirty jokes that's not what UP THE CREEK does. While there is some nudity the majority of the film goes for really stupid laughs with a lot of them aimed at a military school who are constantly trying to destroy things.None of that stuff is overly funny and the film really drags in spots. Again, the lack of any real laughs really hurts things. The casting of the four dummies is quite good, although all of them are playing the type of roles you'd expect. Matheson is the good looking guy constantly looking out for women. This of course is the same role he did in ANIMAL HOUSE. Furst, also from that film, basically does nothing but eat. Monahan plays a horny guy and Helberg is the alcoholic. We also get Jennifer Runyon who of course is easy on the eyes.UP THE CREEK at least gets a rather catchy tune from Cheap Trick but outside of this there's really not too much going for the film.
deheor Sometimes the planets align and everything just comes together. Some likable but underused actors up with a veteran (and really really old) director to film a script written by the author of some minor league films. This is the sort of recipe that more often than not ends up with a mediocre movie that is instantly forgettable but for whatever reasons They ended up producing one of the funniest teen comedies ever made.A group of loser college students played by an all star collection of teen sex comedy stars including Tim Matheson and Stephen Furst from Animal House, Dan Monahan from Porky's and Sandy Helberg from History of the World Part 1 who,having their arms twisted by a corrupt Dean played by John Hillerman, agree to enter a dangerous raft race with the promise that victory will bring them un-earned degrees.Excessive drinking, fart jokes and gratuitous nudity are just some of the pleasures that this movie provides for the viewer. It also features the smartest dog in the world (he does charades), a kick ass song by Cheap Trick and the gorgeous Jennifer Runyon (ghostbusters & Charles in charge, I don't know which credit is more impressive) along with some great race footage and hilarious dialog. This movie is simply much better than it has the right to be.All the people who complain that it is stupid miss the point. Of course it is stupid. Its moronic. Its dumb as dirt. It is also hysterically funny from start to finish. This movie reminds me in many ways of Weekend at Bernies another incredibly goofy movie that if approached in the wrong mood is virtually unwatchable. To avoid injury try not to think. Just sit back and let this movie wash over you.
