MOVIE REVIEW : ‘CAMPUS’--SATIRE OF AMERICAN DREAM

Somehow, a movie about an Arizona State student named Todd--and his marketing success with an all-hunk campus calendar--doesn’t inspire much confidence. Especially when it has a title like “Campus Man” (citywide). And especially when the associate producer is an ex-ASU student named Todd (Headlee), who came up with just such a notion five years ago.

But sometimes movies can fool you; this one is pretty good. Compared to that other young entrepreneur comedy, “Secret of My Success,” “Campus Man” wins on nearly every level: It’s funnier, sharper, sexier, more likable. It’s not really a crossover movie; it has a pat, fairy-tale climax, and its simple, racy style is suited mostly to its youthful target audience. But why shouldn’t that audience have some reasonably good non-art movies, too? Certainly enough shallow, cynically made stinkers have been palmed off on them.

The movie’s college hustler, Todd Barrett (John Dye), is a baby-faced, blarney-stuffed, business-school buzz-bomb, motivated less by ambition than blind panic. Told that he has a month to pay his $10,000 tuition, he dreams up the calendar--inspired partially by his roommate-buddy, diving champ Brett Wilson (Steve Lyon). And, stymied by the banks, he turns to a formidable loan shark, Cactus Jack, a desert outlaw, who probably wants much more than a pound of flesh on late payments. From then on, Todd keeps hopping from precipice to precipice, exhilarating success seemingly just over the ridge, disfigurement or disgrace always hell-hound hot on his tail.

At its best, this is a clever, eyes-open satire of the American Dream. And even at the other extreme, it’s no worse than a cute, lively formula movie.

The script, by Matt Dorff, Alex Horvat and Geoffrey Baere, lacks originality, but it’s canny and well structured. And director Ron Casden keeps things bubbling along, giving you hot, sparky eyefuls. The movie is set on the Arizona State campus in Tempe, and it’s full of packed backgrounds and primary hues: blues and yellows as brightly saturated as a layer of thick paint--lacquered, glowing colors that make a nice counterpoint to Todd’s perpetual-motion desperation.

The cast is good too. Steve Lyon and Kim Delaney are a winning hunk-and-ingenue pair; Kathleen Wilhoite does another amusing hip-flake turn as the radical campus editor; Miles O’Keeffe puts snaky mock-Eastwood charisma into Cactus Jack, and Morgan Fairchild does a nice, coldly sexy fashion editor, hard as painted nails. At the center, John Dye as Todd keeps everything in a whirling balance. He walks just the right giddy line between exploiter and everyman, chutzpah and charm, obnoxiousness and sympathetic absurdity.

“Campus Man” (rated PG) has some human values buried in its comic motor, which may be why it’s more attractive than most of its kin. On one hand, it reveals some sordid roots to success, a huge, intersecting web of self-interest or misguided loyalties. But on the other, it suggests that friends shouldn’t be dumped on or used in a frantic race to fame and riches, that morality is more important than venture capital. At least you can buy that much from John Dye’s motor-mouthed Todd--even if you’d rather pass on his calendar.

‘CAMPUS MAN’

A Paramount Pictures presentation of an RKO Picture. Producers Peggy Fowler, Jon Landau. Director Ron Casden. Script Matt Dorff, Alex Horvat, Geoffrey Baere. Camera Francis Kenny. Music James Newton Howard. With John Dye, Steve Lyon, Kim Delaney, Kathleen Wilhoite, Miles O’Keeffe, Morgan Fairchild.

Running time: 1 hour, 34 minutes.

MPAA rating: PG (parental guidance suggested; some material may not be suitable for children).