Starring: Method Man, Redman, Obba Babatundé, Mike Epps, Anna Maria Horsford Director: Jesse Dylan Year of release: 2001 Country: USA Official site www.howhighmovie.com/ (includes the trailer, which should be enough to stop you from even considering watching the film) (click to enlarge)

God this is bad, even by rowing movie standards, I couldn't actually bear to watch the whole thing, just fast forwarded through to the bits with obvious rowing boats. Two pot-smoking slackers show up to take college entrance exams. Unbeknownst to them, the pot they’re smoking (grown using the ashes of Silas’ best friend, Ivory, who was killed while stoned) brings Ivory's ghost back from the grave. He then helps the duo achieve perfect scores on their exams which makes it possible for them to attend Harvard. Upon arrival as freshmen, they proceed to "enlighten" stuffy Harvard by turning everyone on to drugs, sex and the party life (obviously hadn't seen "harvard man" before they applied.) As long as their "special" stash holds out, they’re sure to ace college and everyone will live happily ever after. But you know that’s not going to happen...

Arriving on campus, Jamal and Silas come across the rowing squad who appear to be rigging boats next to the road, with no river in sight. They instantly get into an arguement with Bart, the stuck up rich white captain of the crew (can you see where this is going) who tells Jamal to forget about rowing because "I train all year round for three seasons to make number one in single sculls". Needless to say this guarantees that Jamal joins up despite never having been anywhere near a boat in his life. Meanwhile, Silas hooks up with Lauren (who's boyfriend is, rather predictably, the rowing club captain). Jamal just about makes it to training at 6am and gets a taxi mid way through the "oar run" to ensure he gets back first. Bart has a hissy-fit but luckily the rowing coach hates the captain with a passion and encourages Jamal to take up rowing as long as he keeps annoying him. The coach, describing Jamal and Bart as his two best athletes (yeah...), forces them to row a double together agasinst Yale (Harvard in blue and Yale in red - go figure?). The race is started and Jamal sits at stroke smoking a joint while Bart rows and shouts abuse at him from the bow seat - until a large halucination of his mother appears in the sky and starts nagging him, at which point he starts rating over 200 - and they win the race (guaranteeing him an "A" in crew). I believe that this is the only holywood movie to feature a Water rower (see last picture above) - on which Jamal can been seen alternating "stroke" with "smoke" while people carry boats in the background. That was all the rowing related stuff in the film - I couldn't bear to watch anymore to find out what happened to the captain in the end (though i presume it involves getting stoned as that's what happens to everyone else). The film's sequences at "Harvard" were actually shot at UCLA.