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Thomas Mann, Oliver Cooper, Jonathan Brown, Dax Flame, Kirby Bliss Blanton ... see more see more... , Brady Hender , Nick Nervies , Alexis Knapp , Miles Teller , Peter Mackenzie , Caitlin Dulany , Rob Evors , Rick Shapiro , Martin Klebba , Pete Gardner , Nichole O'Connor , Sam Lant , Henry Michaelson , Brendan Miller , David Sánchez , Ayydé Vargas , Chelsea Carbaugh-Rutland , Zach Lasry , Michael C. Stretton , Andrew Harbour , Allan Chanes , Holden Morse , Raz Mataz , Briana Mari Wilde , Jarod Einsohn , Chet Hanks , Julian Evens , Jesse Marco , Chic Daniel , Kevin Dunigan , Colleen Flynn , Sophia Santi , Jodi Harris , Frank Buckley , Serene Branson , Robb Reesman , Kevin Ryder , Bean Baxter , Big Boy , Jimmy Kimmel , Jillian Barberie

The Hangover's Todd Phillips produces this top-secret comedy from writers Matt Drake and Michael Bacall, with helming duties handled by commercial director Nima Nourizadeh. ~ Jeremy Wheeler, Rovi

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62% liked it

87,062 ratings

Critics

27% liked it

129 critics

R, 1 hr. 28 min.

Directed by: Nima Nourizadeh, Jonathan Kaplan

Release Date: March 2, 2012

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DVD Release Date: June 19, 2012

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Flixster Reviews (5,319)

  • TheDudeLebowski65
    January 1, 2013
    TheDudeLebowski65
    Project X is a horrible excuse for a comedy film. The film is crude, obscene and void of genuine laughs or good entertainment value. Right off the bat, you don't sympathize with the characters and you don't care about them either. A few lines made me smile, but overall this is on... read moree weak comedy and it doesn't stand out whatsoever. There's no thought in what went in to making this film and it seems as if the film's idea was drawn up on a napkin and studio executives were like "oh let's make a film with teens partying and drinking their asses off!" This is a dreadful movie that relies on teen party clichés for its plot. The film could have been much better, and it just ends up being a pointless mess from start to finish. To me this is just the bottom of the barrel of entertainment. I advise you if you consider watching something else if you come across this piece of crap. This is one film that never should have been made. I despised this one like the plague, and if you want a better party oriented film, watch Superbad, at least that one had great jokes, a good cast and plenty of terrific chaos that actually was hilarious. The only comical bits here are the parts where the Mercedes gets driven into the pool and the guy crashing the party with the flamethrower. Project X is a mess pure and simple, and it is definitely not a smart comedy. This is one of the worst films of 2012 and it is a film to definitely avoid.
  • YLOWBSTARDreturns
    October 26, 2012
    YLOWBSTARDreturns
    This movie sucks; big time. Some of the chaos that occurs in the film's final forth was pretty entertaining, but that isn't saying much. "Project X" is the most unlikable movie I've seen in ages. The characters, the endless montages, and the (failed) humor; all trite.
  • mrbungle7821
    October 11, 2012
    mrbungle7821
    We've all had the fantasy of throwing an awesome party, a revelry of youthful exuberance, and cutting loose. The house party is a teenaged rite of passage. Project X is produced by Todd Phillips, the director behind The Hangover as the advertising would like to burn into your ass... read moreociative memory. You'd expect some wacky comedy and boorish behavior from boys living out their wildest fantasies. I felt a deep sadness watching the events of Project X. I won't bemoan it as evidence of the decline of Western civilization but it's certainly not helping matters.

    Thomas (Thomas Mann) is a gawky, awkward, nice kid who's celebrating his 17th birthday. His upper middle-class parents are going away for the weekend and trusting their only child with care of the home. Naturally, Thomas' best friends, Costa (Oliver Cooper) and JB (Jonathan Daniel Brown), take this opportunity to stage a party. They invite all the popular girls at school, spread word via radio and Craiglist, and hundreds descend on Thomas's family grounds with the intent of partying harder than Andrew W.K. Kirby (Kirby Bliss Blanton), long a friend of Thomas, is crushing on the guy and he doesn't realize it. His attentions are on Alexis (Alexis Knapp), the school's unattainable Hot Girl. As Costa clarifies, this party is meant to be a game-changer for their social lives. They're supposed to reach for the stars tonight, which means groping strangers and puking in the bushes. Aim high, boys.

    This did not have to be a found footage movie, and Project X would have been better if stripped of this tedious gimmick. By making this a found footage movie, it roots the quickly escalating madness in a reality that cannot contain it. The film's credibility goes out the window without a thought. A wild party that rages out of control is a believable setup, but when you toss in so many out-of-nowhere outlandish elements, including an angry midget, a crazed drug dealer armed with a flame thrower, and a high-story zipline (who put that there?), and the groundswell of a consequences-free riot, you strain all sense of believability. I also found it unrealistic how blasé people reacted to the presence of a camera in certain situations. I think people at a school might not want to be recorded for who knows what purpose. But easily the scene that stands out is a locker room with a bunch of guys in various states of undress. Seriously, not one character, not even a minor character, raises any issue with someone casually recording a place where men are undressing. I'll grant the exhibitionist antics of the party (the courts of our land have ruled that flashing is not considered an "invasion of privacy"). Then there are also the lighting changes at Thomas' house. All of a sudden certain rooms have very distinct, stylish blues and greens for lighting. Where did that come from? Did someone find a colorful bulb? These are the dumb questions that arise under the belabored pretenses of a found footage movie. There's no reason this movie shouldn't have ditched the found footage gimmick and simply played it straight.

    Congratulations Project X, for it was you who cemented the death knell of my youth. I don't have anything against party movies (Superbad is great, Can't Hardly Wait ain't bad either) and I don't shrink from the presence of ribald, juvenile, inappropriate and/or illegal underage activity. Dazed and Confused is one of my favorite films of all time and that movie is nothing but kids getting drunk and stoned. But lo, Project X was the first party movie I've watched where my sympathies lay not with the party animals but with the annoyed neighbors and parents. Maybe it's a sign of getting older; maybe it's just the culmination of my upstairs neighbors playing heavy-bass electronica music at all hours of the night when I have to work in the morning. Or maybe it's just a clear indication that this movie fails on any level to make me care about these moronic, annoying, unbearable characters. So when these twits are off celebrating the wanton hedonism unleashed in their backyards, I thought of the neighbor with a baby who just wants his kid to sleep. Is that an unreasonable request? The man isn't presented as some incensed, dangerous madman, and what does he get for daring to question the noise level of this party? The man gets tazed. That's what you get for expecting anyone to possibly be moderately considerate about their action affecting others (I sense a God Bless America-style rant approaching). I just found this whole thoughtless, empty exercise to be exploitative, mean-spirited, and exhausting. Am I that old or is this movie simply that bad?

    You want to know how flimsy the plot is for this monstrosity? You could have written the entire thing on a napkin. Why bother with characters or story? This movie is seriously like someone took the Smashing Pumpkins music video for "1979" (possibly the best cruising song, I would argue) and expanded it to feature length. Even at barely 80 minutes, this is one creaky movie that struggles to pad out its running time. The party mostly consists of two-second shots of people jumping around, girls shaking their asses, people smashing things, people vomiting, and the occasional boob flash to remind you how similar in tone the film is to the sleazy Girls Gone Wild series. That's at least half the movie, if I'm being generous. What did I just describe? A music video! A music video is composed of, often, nonsensical images that serve little purpose other than to stimulate. There are plenty of segments that are nothing but pounding music and people dancing. If you buy the soundtrack (and why wouldn't you since it'll be ringing in your ears for days) and do some pseudo-inebriated dance movies, you've basically recreated the plot in your own living room. Project X is a music video writ large, not just in its style or in its single-minded execution to do nothing but string a series of rapid imagery. Good Lord, if this stuff made the final film what was left on the cutting room floor?

    Project X also has the ignoble distinction of making me loathe a character not just in his very introduction but also in the very opening SECOND of the film. The first second I got of Costa told me everything I needed to know. His smarmy, irritating, faux "gangsta" machismo persona was enough. I knew this guy was going to be a douchebag. One second in, Project X, and you've already dug yourself a pretty significant hole. The Costa character is unfunny from beginning to end. There is not a single joke, a single one-liner, a single reaction of his that made me laugh. He is an insufferable character and a transparent combination of Superbad's McLovin' and Jonah Hill's character. I hated every wretched second his face was onscreen. The other two friends didn't make me want to punch my TV, which was the only positive thing I could say about either of them. Thomas is your typical mild-mannered, awkward teen (read: the Michael Cera role) who gets to cut loose and grow a spine of sorts. He has no personality and I couldn't work up the effort to root for him. I can't really say anything about JB because he adds absolutely nothing to the movie. He has no personality as well, other than his girth and desire to bed some ladies. It's like the movie forgets he even exists. I know I did.

    I know that making a feminist diatribe against this movie is a waste of time but indulge me for a moment, dear reader. I understand that this entire enterprise is untamed male fantasy and wish fulfillment. I don't have a problem with this notion, on the surface. But why do all the women of this fantasy have to be reduced to, in Costa's words, "drunk bitches" and "hos"? The women of this universe, which is supposed to be our own remember, are merely walking toys ready to be exploited for male entertainment. We don't get characters; we get attractive women in great states of exhibitionism. It's ridiculous the amount of older, attractive women who would be enticed by... a high school party? Don't these people have college parties they'd rather be attending? At one point JB identifies one of the girls at the party as a woman who posed for Playboy, because that's all women are good for in this movie. Why would Alexis agree to bed Thomas just because it's his birthday? We see no connection, and he's certainly not a wealth of charisma. It doesn't matter. Women are to be ogled. They are decorative.

    Then there's the aggravating romance between Thomas and his best girl friend, Kirby. First off, if this is the quality you get with girl-next-door types then I am moving to that neighborhood. This woman is a bonafide hottie, so when the guys make dismissive comments that Kiby is just one of the guys, I question what criteria these men have for female beauty. Any of these guys would be lucky to ever interest a woman of this stature. And then there's the fact that she so easily forgives of Thomas after he makes an ass of himself and tries to hook up with another girl hours after sleeping with Kirby. It's like the movie advertising that you, American teenage males, can have it all and with a minimum of humility and empathy.

    I guess the real question is whether any of this gratuitous debauchery is fun. The whole movie runs on the caffeinated, fist-pumping highs of unchecked male ego and fantasy, but it's trying so hard to be the most epic party ever, and that's the only ambition the film has. This is one sleazy and off-putting movie. Even some of its egregious faults could be partially forgiven if the movie was any funny. It just isn't. It's loud and profane and anarchic but without interesting, relatable, or even defined characters, and the plot is so feeble I could sum it up thusly: Nerds throw party. Crap happens. They get to be cool. In between those momentous plot points is a lot of incoherent imagery of people dancing, women being objectified (by the camera, the filmmakers, the audience), and pounding music. The plot is so simplistic, so plainly an afterthought, that the entire hedonistic festivity reeks of lazy exploitation. Congratulations, Project X, you've turned me into my parents. Now get the hell off my lawn and get a job and make better movies!

    Nate's Grade: D
  • Crashinkov
    September 15, 2012
    Crashinkov
    if you had some time and nothing to do, this movie good to waste it.
  • allan913
    September 11, 2012
    allan913
    A hilarious off the wall comedy thats crude, rude, insane, silly and totally brilliant. An instant comedy classic. It`s Superbad on acid. A laugh-out loud riot from start to finish. One hell of a madhouse party movie that`s too much un to pass up. It delivers lots of crazy antics... read more, wild jokes and great fun.
  • LWOODS04
    August 31, 2012
    LWOODS04
    "This was like a really bad version of Superbad. The three main characters were OK, but there was no real character developement. Most of the movie failed to impress me. I got rather bored with the movie pretty quickly. It wasn't as funny as it made itself out to be either. Which... read more mainly was because they put the only funny snippets into the previews. The movie just didn't do it for me."
  • blkbomb
    July 8, 2012
    blkbomb
    Costa: 'Til the Break of Dawn, Yo!

    "The Party You've Only Dreamed About"

    Project X knows its target audience and gives them just what they want, and what they want isn't a great movie. They want drinking, drugs, sex, loud music, and tons and tons of naked boobies. That's all th... read moree American teenager wants and that's what we're given with Project X. I belong to that target audience. I just graduated high school and am getting ready to go to college. Partying's a big part of anybody around my age's life. This movie was fun to watch because of my age, but I can't say it was a good movie, because it isn't. 

    Project X is a lot of slow motion dancing, drinking, and making out. At times the movie is cool. At other times, it seems like they're just trying to make it to a respectable runtime. It is what it is. That's what I like about it. It isn't trying to be anything more than a party movie. Thomas' parents are going out of town for the weekend and leave him in charge of the house. Thomas isn't the type of guy to throw a big party, but his friend Costa takes over. He invites everybody, and soon the party is fucking huge. There's a midget, there's an old guy hanging around, there's topless girls everywhere, there's an ecstasy filled Gnome. As far as just the party goes, it has everything. Obviously things get out of control though, but it doesn't really play out like a cautionary tale for Thomas, which was kind of surprise and a disappointment. 

    Basically this movie is just a commercial for partying, which makes sense seeing as it was directed by someone who had only made commercials beforehand. It's fun, forgettable entertainment. The film is pretty pointless, and doesn't serve any purpose at all, but that's alright. Probably not necessary viewing for anyone over the age of twenty five, but for anyone who's inside that target range; you should enjoy yourself just enough to Mae this 80 minute runtime worth the watch.
  • 3niR
    July 6, 2012
    3niR
    Disgusting.
  • hobster1
    July 2, 2012
    hobster1
    Project X is a pretty weak excuse for a plot. Young Thomas and his cohorts are planning a party for his 17th birthday. They're outsiders and hope that their little shindig is attended by enough attractive girls and popular guys to make them more accepted. The celebration amongst ... read morethe high schoolers starts out rather modestly, then spins wildly out of control. It aims to be outrageous for its strident politically incorrectness, but it just winds up being kind of pointless. Project X was originally marketed to showcase that Todd Phillips, director of The Hangover, produced this mess. Co-writer Michael Bacall was also responsible for Scott Pilgrim vs. the World and the 21 Jump Street screenplay, so there's some talent behind the lens. But any expectations of quality are dashed as the chronicle unfolds to reveal a sloppily filmed record of debauchery and music. One, two, three music videos that highlight montages of wild party shenanigans with dance music, doesn't disguise the issue that there's no story.
  • fb100000883534329
    July 1, 2012
    fb100000883534329
    I thought this was a great concept. A 'found footage' film about a huge party. How can you go wrong?... well, make it as unbelieveable as humanly possible. As soon as I saw a beer get thrown at a cop and then every cop runs away to wait until the party ended, that's when I was... read more lost. This is California Cops. They'll beat the crap out of someone in waves for doing much, much less then a beer in the face. Also, the party going on for 10 hours? I'm sorry, call me a noob if you want but after a 5 hour mark, I just want to sleep and sleep and sleep. I liked how the craziness of the party esculated to midget crashing a car in the pool and **SPOILER** a redneck meth head burning down the entire neighborhood with a flame thrower! If they took the unbelieveable crap out and kept the out of hand stuff then I would have liked this movie more. But as it stands, I couldn't get into it. I'm alittle shocked this film isn't NC-17. When you see what these underage teens do in this film, I know they're older actors playing teens but I just was shocked what they were able to get away with. Just go to a real party that wont end in teen pregnancy instead of seeing this film. You'll save 9 bucks and child support. 4/10

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Critic Reviews

Colin Covert
March 5, 2012
Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star Tribune

This is a film desperately in need of a McLovin. Also, jokes would help. And comedic chemistry between the actors. And an ending that isn't a bolted-on cop-out. Save yourselves. It's too late for me. Full Review

Peter Travers
March 3, 2012
Peter Travers, Rolling Stone

The movie has all the heft of a tweet, but Philips has made it look pimp and, until the police end the party, Project X really is a riot. Full Review

James Berardinelli
March 2, 2012
James Berardinelli, ReelViews

Ultimately, Project X is an example of why gimmicks rarely work, especially once the new shine has worn off. Full Review

Robert Abele
March 2, 2012
Robert Abele, Los Angeles Times

"Project X" bears a cravenly piggish attitude toward rewarding socially unacceptable behavior that feels unseemly rather than exciting, so-what rather than so-funny and obvious instead of new. Full Review

Melissa Anderson
March 2, 2012
Melissa Anderson, Village Voice

"There's a midget in the oven!" is about as inspired as the dialogue and set pieces get in this queasy-making entertainment about a 17-year-old dude's birthday bacchanalia. Full Review

Peter Howell
March 2, 2012
Peter Howell, Toronto Star

The parent and homeowner in me were appalled by the debauchery and incredible property damage. The teenage boy in me couldn't help but smirk anyway. Full Review

Peter Debruge
March 2, 2012
Peter Debruge, Variety

With its cast of unfamiliar faces and catalog of underage wish-fulfillment fantasies, this game-changing instant classic will doubtless inspire imitators. Full Review

Alonso Duralde
March 2, 2012
Alonso Duralde, The Wrap

These kids apparently attend Actress-Model High School, where the guys run the gamut from hot to dorky, but practically every female is skinny, stacked and ready to flash their racks to apparently doz... Full Review

Tom Long
March 2, 2012
Tom Long, Detroit News

As party porn goes, "Project X" has its moments. In terms of drama, character or intelligence, it's pure bong water. Full Review

Rick Groen
March 2, 2012
Rick Groen, Globe and Mail

It's a perfectly lame movie that speaks intriguingly to the way we live now. Full Review

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Facts

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    • Freshman Party Crasher: Come on Costa, there's like 200 people here!
    • Costa: The only thing your working on is diabetes you fat fuck. [talking to JB]
    • Thomas: This place is ghetto as fuck. [talking about T-Rick's house]
    • Costa: The guy isn't going to do shit. He punched a 12-year old in the face.
    • T-Rick: Costa! Give me back my fucking gnome!
    • Costa: Mr. Kub, how cool is it that Thomas was born on your anniversary, yeah? What a great anniversary gift. A baby.
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Project X : Watch Free on TV

Project X Trivia

  • This great actress starred alongside Matthew Broderick in Project X, was the mother of the kid who paid it all forward, won an Oscar in a movie with Jack Nicholson and spent several years married to Paul Reiser in TV before wanting to chase tornadoes with Bill Paxton.  Answer »
  • What 1987 movie starring Matthew Broderick contained chimpanzees named Virgil, Goofy, Bluebeard, Goliath and Spike?  Answer »
  • Matthew Broderick is a scientist who discovers that the intelligent ape he's training will be he subject of a lethal military experiment. Can he and the Chimp Escape? Also feature Helen Hunt. name the movie?  Answer »
  • What actress played in Twister, Project X, Girls just want to have fun, What women want and Cast Away?  Answer »
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