Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #31490 in DVD
• Released on: 2004-06-01
• Rating: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
• Formats: Anamorphic, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English, French
• Subtitled in: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 97 minutes

Amazon.com
Not nearly as raunchy as some of the other teen exploitation films that came out around the same time, Summer School is a feel-good movie in which all the characters are clueless, but also kind of likeable for some inexplicable reason. Mark Harmon stars as Freddy Shoop, a lazy physical education instructor who is forced by his nemesis (aka The Principal) to teach summer school. He's not lucky enough to get the overachiever kids who attend summer school because they want to; Shoop gets the students who have to attend because they've failed. As you might expect, his class is full of lazy losers who don't think of summer school as real school. Actually, Shoop kind of agrees with them. He's not as irresponsible as he would have them believe, although he's not above bribing them to do their best. Released theatrically in 1987, the film stars a very young Courtney Thorne-Smith (Melrose Place, According to Jim) as one of the students. And Kirstie Alley (Cheers) appears as Shoop's love interest. Directed by Carl Reiner, Summer School has an almost innocent feel. It's the silly movie trying to pass itself off as naughty, but really it's not. Summer School was released before filmmakers knew they needed to save good outtakes and bloopers for DVDs, so the special features aren't all that special. The most appealing is footage of some of the cast members while the film was being shot. But if you're curious about listening to the audio commentary offered by Harmon and Reiner, take a pass. Though both men are charming on talk shows, neither is particularly insightful here. --Jae-Ha Kim

Customer Reviews

Harmless Fun
1987's Summer School is an underrated comedy from the 80's. The plot revolves around reluctant summer school teacher, Freddy Shoop (Mark Harmon), who is forced into the job after the original teacher hits the lottery. Shoop is a gym teacher and he must deal with a classroom full of typical high school misfits. Throughout the summer, Shoop's unconventional teaching methods get him trouble with the school's vice principal, but wins over the kids. The film is carried by the immensely likable cast. Mr. Harmon reactions to the student's quirks and miscues are perfectly timed and the students provide genuine laughs. Dean Cameron & Gary Riley are hilarious as shock meisters Chainsaw and Dave, Richard Steven Horowitz plays the perfect geek as Alan Eakain and a young Courtney Thorne-Smith is alluring as Pam House who develops a big time thing for Shoop. Kirstie Alley shows up as a love interest for Shoop. Summer School is a great, lightweight movie that is small on plot, but big on laughs and fun.

Great Movie
Summer School is by far one of my all-time favorite movies to watch. You can never get bored with it, I must have watched it 200 times or more. The movie is all about a high school gym teacher (Mark Harmon) Freddy Shoop who is forced to teach remedial English class in summer school to a group of social misfits. Shoop has no idea how to teach and instead of hitting the books, they hit the amusement parks, beaches, petting zoos, amongst other places. His students include: Chainsaw & Dave who are obssessed with horror movies and play pranks on the vice president. Larry who sleeps in class throughout the entire movie. Pam who has a crush on her teacher Mr. Shoop. Jerome Watkins who spends 9 weeks in the bathroom because his zipper got stuck! Allen Ekian who is your basic "geek/nerd". Ronda who is pregnant and doesn't know who the father is. Denise Green who is trying to get her drivers license but is a terrible driver to say the least! In order for Shoop to get his students to learn he has to bribe them! Chainsaw & Dave get to have a party at shoops house on the 4th of July, a ride to and from work, plus a in school screening of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre movie. Larry gets his own bed in the classroom. Pam "needs a place to stay" and gets to move in with Mr. Shoop. Mr. Shoop has to become Ronda's Lamoz coach. He has to give Denise driving lessons. And Mr. Shoop has to be Kevin's "tackling dummy" in case he makes it back on the football team. It's hard to explain in words how funny this movie is, you'll just have to see it for yourself!

Great film, but a disappointing double-dip DVD release.
Everybody knows SUMMER SCHOOL is an 80's classic, so I'll skip the review and tell you what the "Life's a Beach Edition" features are.

A 2.35:1 widescreen transfer compared to the original DVD's 1.78:1, a trailer, a stills gallery, a boring audio commentary with director Carl Reiner and Mark Harmon and two short featurettes.

The first featurette: "Inside the Teachers Lounge" (14 min.) stars writer Jeff Franklin, director Carl Reiner and cast members Mark Harmon, Patrick Labyorteaux, Robin Thomas, Dean Cameron, and Ken Olandt. The second is "Summer School Yearbook" (10 min.) has some interview clips of the cast. Nothing deep or profound...it's only 10 minutes long.

Is it worth buying if you already have the original DVD? Not really.

Also what's up with the misleading "bikini xing" cover art? The movie's rated PG-13.