Adventureland

It was the worst job they ever imagined… and the best time of their lives.
Adventureland (2009)
Timing: 1:47 (107 min)
6.8/10
206 781
—
no scores
6.4/10
2418
6.8/10
174000
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Release date
Country
Genre
Budget
$9 800 000
Revenue
$17 164 377
Website
Director
Scenario
Producer
Ted Hope, Anne Carey, Sidney Kimmel, William Horberg, Bruce Toll
Operator
Terry Stacey
Composer
Ira Kaplan
Artist
Stephen Beatrice
Audition
Ann Goulder
Editing
Anne McCabe
All team (23)

Short description

Adventureland is set in the summer of 1987. James Brennan, a recent college graduate, has his plans for a European trip cancelled when his parents tell him they cannot pay for it. He needs money before school resumes, but the only work he can find is at a local amusement park, where he takes a low-paying job running games. There he meets Em Lewin, a co-worker, and the months that follow change what he expected from the summer.

Greg Mottola wrote and directed the film, which followed his 2007 comedy Superbad in his filmography and sits between that film and Paul from 2011. Jesse Eisenberg plays James, with Kristen Stewart as Em. Martin Starr, Kristen Wiig, Bill Hader and Margarita Levieva appear in supporting roles, and the credited cast runs to 47 names. Ted Hope, Anne Carey and Sidney Kimmel produced.

Made for about 10 million dollars, the film took roughly 17 million dollars worldwide. On IMDb it holds 6.8/10 from around 174,000 votes, while on TMDB it stands at 6.4/10 from about 2,400 votes. A critics' rating of 7.5/10 from 213 reviews places it above both audience scores, indicating stronger approval from reviewers than from the wider public.

What's left behind the scenes

  • Director Greg Mottola initially planned to film the movie in a real “Amusement Park,” but later abandoned the idea in favor of familiar sets.
  • The film premiered on the same day as the opening of the very park in which Mottola had planned to shoot the movie.
  • The real “Amusement Park” is located on Long Island.
  • Kristen Wiig and Bill Hader were on set for only four days. All scenes involving their characters had to be filmed consecutively and quickly due to the actors’ commitment to filming the Saturday Night Live project.
  • The film was shot during the winter months, so people had to be hired specifically to clear the snow. During the filming of some indoor scenes, extras deliberately blocked the windows and doors to prevent snowy landscapes from appearing in the frame.
  • The director of the first part of the vampire saga "Twilight", Catherine Hardwicke, flew to Pittsburgh specifically to meet Kristen Stewart and cast her as Isabella.
  • On James's first day working at the toy horse races, during one of the runs, a purple horse is already halfway through, the camera takes a close-up, and it's visible that the horse is at the very beginning, but the race continues. In the next frame, the horse is already at the finish line.

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