''The Real Cancun'' is a 2003 American

reality film Reality film or reality movie describes a genre of films that have resulted from reality television, such as ''The Real Cancun'', MTV's film version of '' The Real World'', which was originally titled ''Spring Break: The Reality Movie''. In an art ...

directed by Rick de Oliveira and written by Brian Caldirola. Inspired by the

reality television Reality television is a genre of television programming that documents purportedly unscripted real-life situations, often starring unfamiliar people rather than professional actors. Reality television emerged as a distinct genre in the early 1 ...

genre, this film followed the lives of sixteen Americans from March 13–23, 2003 as they celebrated spring break in

Cancún Cancún ( ), often Cancun in English (without the accent; or ) is a city in southeast Mexico on the northeast coast of the Yucatán Peninsula in the Mexican state of Quintana Roo. It is a significant tourist destination in Mexico and the seat ...

Mexico Mexico (Spanish language, Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a List of sovereign states, country in the southern portion of North America. It is borders of Mexico, bordered to the north by the United States; to the so ...

and experienced romantic relationships, emotional strife, or just had a good time. The film received negative critical reviews and was a

box office flop A box-office bomb, or box-office disaster, is a film that is unprofitable or considered highly unsuccessful during its theatrical run. Although any film for which the production, marketing, and distribution costs combined exceed the revenue after ...

, earning a little over $5 million in the United States from a $7.5 million budget. It was the film debut of Laura Ramsey.

Cast

* Benjamin "Fletch" Fletcher * Nicole Frilot * Roxanne Frilot * David Ingber * Jeremy Jazwinski * Amber Madison * Paul Malbry * Marquita "Skye" Marshall aka Skye P Marshall * Laura Ramsey * Matthew Slenske * Alan Taylor * Heidi Vance * Casey Weeks * Sarah Wilkins * Jorell Washington * Adam Miller *

Grant George Grant George is an American voice actor who is known for voicing characters in anime dubs and video games. George is best known as the voice of Izuru Kira from the internationally acclaimed ''Bleach'' anime series, the Warrior of Light from ''F ...

as Miscellaneous voices * Hot Action Cop *

Simple Plan Simple Plan is a Canadian rock band from Montreal, Quebec, formed in 1999. The band's lineup consists of Pierre Bouvier (lead vocals, studio bass guitar), Chuck Comeau (drums), Jeff Stinco (lead guitar), and Sébastien Lefebvre (rhythm guit ...

Snoop Dogg Calvin Cordozar Broadus Jr. (born October 20, 1971), known professionally as Snoop Dogg (previously Snoop Doggy Dogg and briefly Snoop Lion), is an American rapper. His fame dates back to 1992 when he featured on Dr. Dre's debut solo single, " ...

Release

''The Real Cancun'' was released theatrically only a month after filming was completed, and was released on DVD and home video only a couple of months after that.

Box office

The film earned $2,108,796 in its opening weekend from 2,261 venues, ranking tenth in the North American box office and fourth among the week's new releases. It closed a month later, having grossed $3,825,421 domestically and $1,519,662 overseas for a worldwide total of $5,345,083, coming well short of its $7.5 million production cost.

Critical response

''The Real Cancun'' received generally negative reviews from critics (with ''

Variety Variety may refer to: Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats * Variety (radio) * Variety show, in theater and television Films * ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont * ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...

s Scott Foundas causing to remark in his review that ''The Real Cancun'' billed itself as "the first reality feature film" is "apparently ignoring last year's '' Jackass: The Movie''").The Real Cancun
Scott Foundas, ''

'', April 20, 2003. On

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...

website

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wan ...

, the film holds a 35% score based on 88 reviews, with an average rating of 4.2/10. The site's consensus states: "The footage is predictable and rather tame, and most of the people are uninteresting."

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...

reports a 34 out of 100 rating based on 24 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews". Audiences polled by

CinemaScore CinemaScore is a market research firm based in Las Vegas. It surveys film audiences to rate their viewing experiences with letter grades, reports the results, and forecasts box office receipts based on the data. Background Ed Mintz founded Ci ...

gave the film an average grade of "C−" on an A+ to F scale.

Awards and nominations

The film was nominated for Worst Picture and Worst Excuse for an Actual Movie (All Concept/No Content) at the 24th Golden Raspberry Awards. It lost both awards to '' Gigli'' for the former and ''

The Cat in the Hat ''The Cat in the Hat'' is a 1957 children's book written and illustrated by the American author Theodor Geisel, using the pen name Dr. Seuss. The story centers on a tall anthropomorphic cat who wears a red and white-striped top hat and a red b ...

'' for the latter.

Thematic analysis

Carol Siegel, a professor of English and American Studies at Washington State University Vancouver, interpreted ''The Real Cancun'' as about society's expectations of juveniles' sexual behaviors; despite visuals such as near nudity and simulations of the act, the characters try to present themselves as being abstinent and not " slut"-ty, and only two couples make love by the end.

Aftermath

A reality movie based upon the '' Girls Gone Wild'' video series that MGM bought the rights to was never put into production, while the

Universal Pictures Universal Pictures (legally Universal City Studios LLC, also known as Universal Studios, or simply Universal; common metonym: Uni, and formerly named Universal Film Manufacturing Company and Universal-International Pictures Inc.) is an Americ ...

effort ''Drunken Jackasses: The Quest'' was delayed after the flop of ''Cancun'' and ultimately went straight to video.Moviegoers resoundingly reject reality of 'Cancun'
Scott Bowles, ''

USA TODAY ''USA Today'' (stylized in all uppercase) is an American daily middle-market newspaper and news broadcasting company. Founded by Al Neuharth on September 15, 1982, the newspaper operates from Gannett's corporate headquarters in Tysons, Virgini ...

'', 4/28/2003.

References

External links

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Trailer
{{DEFAULTSORT:Real Cancun, The 2003 films 2003 documentary films American documentary films Cancún Films about spring break Films shot in Mexico New Line Cinema films Films scored by Michael Suby 2000s English-language films 2000s American films