Not
to be confused with the Van Damme film of the same name, this
is the tale of young Eddie's attempt to lose his virginity with
a little help from his
friends. The ploy; a trip to Cabos San Lucas in
Mexico, where surely even the mopiest college misfit could have
consesual sex, drink and parties in pretty much equal proportions.
The pitch is slightly
different though. These are real
high school kids (and so an authentic, real-live
virgin too we guess) who play or play up to the camera just
about anything that comes into their heads. Here you have their
tequila-soaked, sun-drenched holiday memories as they were preserved
on celluloid. there are also lots of scenes in which young Americans
strip, bump and grind against each other. the less attractive
girls seem to on holiday to other places: in Cabos San Lucas
breast exposure and lesbian lite is very popular among the girls,
apparently. Frustration and fantasy have no place here. It's
all very literal, interspersed with some reflections by the
guys, and phone calls to the girls back home.
The peculiarity of
this film is that it takes reality
tv to the movie's. the low standards of tv mockumentary need
cinema's liberty of expression to fulfill themselves, so to
speak. 'Quest' was directed by Mike Fleiss, one of the impresarios
of 'reality' tv in Amercia, and he chose his boys with care.
The buddies are as scripted as characters in a tv movie, or
a stcom. there's the comic, with a big wig, the sensitive jock
with the girlfriend back home, the quirky one, the gross one,
and of course the
virgin...it all looks so familiar in this respect that
we don't know whether life is imitating bad television; or was
it already like that? oo-er.
There are worse things
in life than being dumb high
school jocks who have one thought - how to get their rocks off.
making a film like this is one of things. There were some things
in this that I'd never seen before, such as a beautiful woman
drinking tequila from a cock-and-balls shaped glass and pouring
the rest on her breasts and crotch, so I guess I learned something
too. If you hate cinema, you'll dig 'The Quest.'
Extras
Languages and subtitles
are in English, French,
German, Dutch, Danish, Norwegian, Finnish, Swedish.
There are ten deleted
scenes, with titles like
‘friggin' in the riggin,’ ‘shave your balls’
and ‘tampon darts.’ Don’t miss these and other
Cinema Vérité jewels; see the guys getting naked
in the bar
or debating the merits of different sexual positions.
There’s some crazy stuff too with a six-foot
inflatable penis.
More interesting
than the movie are the eight short
documentary sequences about young American tourists in Mexico,
featuring interviews with locals, barmen, hotel owners and cleaners,
as well as the Americans.
