A 2001 teen comedy directed by Tommy O'Haver, starring Ben Foster and Kirsten Dunst. Like 10 Things I Hate About You and She's the Man, it is a loose High School adaptation of a Shakespearean play— in this case, A Midsummer Night's Dream.
Berke Landers (Foster) has been dating his high school sweetheart Allison (Melissa Sagemiller) for years—until the day she dumps him for the vaguely-British ex-boy band member Striker (Shane West). Allison and Striker sign up for the upcoming school play, a musical adaptation of A Midsummer Night's Dream, and in an attempt to win back his beloved, Berke does too. Unlike Allison and Striker, Berke has no acting, singing, or dancing talent, and so enlists the help of his best friend's little sister, Kelly (Dunst), to teach him the ways of drama. As his rivalry with Striker grows, Berke finds himself growing closer to Kelly... and to add to his troubles, one of the leads breaks his leg, landing Berke with a leading role!
Meanwhile, Berke and his friends find themselves in many American Pie-esque situations. Hilarity Ensues!
While hardly the best of the teen-Shakespeare movies of the 2000s, Get Over It has an odd charm to it, due in part to its wacky and sometimes surreal humour (rather fitting, considering the source material). Arguably the best part is "A Midsummer Night's Rockin' Eve", the rock musical version of AMSND they dreamt up for the movie.
This movie provides examples of:
- Adaptation Personality Change: Kelly is portrayed as a Girl Next Door, filing off Helena's Clingy Jealous Girl tendencies.
- Adaptational Villainy: Allison when compared to Hermia. The latter is forced by her father to marry Demetrius. The former dumps Berke so she can date Striker.
- All Love Is Unrequited: Well, it is based off A Midsummer Night's Dream... Kelly loves Berke, Berke loves Allison, Allison loves Striker, Striker is dating Allison but cheats on her, attempting it once with Kelly... yeah.
- All Musicals Are Adaptations: In-universe. The school play is a musical adaptation of A Midsummer Night's Dream.
- All Part of the Show: The scrapping between Striker and Berke on stage is assumed by the audience to just be part of the show - since their characters are rivals too.
- Almost Kiss: Kelly and Berke, before her Moment Killer brother phones.
- Amazingly Embarrassing Parents: How Berke sees his parents. They force him to talk about his break-up on live television, they respond to his arrest in a strip club by offering to take him out for frozen yoghurt (then offering to take him home and let him masturbate) and they only reason they get mad about the Wild Teen Party he (technically, Felix) throws later on is because had they known, they could've paid for a DJ. Berke finally snaps at them after that last one, but they don't seem to notice.Berke: You're my parents for god's sake, STOP TRUSTING ME!
- Ambiguously Gay: Peter Wong, the school's resident theatre geek who at one point refers to Doctor Forest Oates as his "special friend."
- Amusing Injuries: Dora Lynn's entire character, not to mention an incident where Striker throws nun-chuks and hits Jessica in the crotch. Later in the movie, Kelly accidentally shoots Berke with a crossbow.
- And Starring: Martin Short is credited this way.
- As Himself: Coolio and Vitamin C in a bizarre musical number after Allison has dumped Berke.
- Bait-and-Switch: Both times Berke is caught doing something by his parents, they don't punish him and turn out to be thrilled. They're ecstatic when he's arrested at a strip club - because it means he's moving on from his break-up. It's a similar situation when they find a party going on at the house.
- Beleaguered Assistant: Jessica to Dr Oates. Poor girl puts up with all kinds of crap from him, and gets nun-chucked in the "front bum" for her troubles.
- Blonde, Brunette, Redhead:
- Kelly (blonde), Basin (brunette) and Allison (redhead). Maggie is a black girl, adding another colour to the spectrum.
- Male examples too. Dennis (blond), Felix (brunet) and Berke (redhead).
- Boy Band: Striker was a member of one called "The Swingtown Lads".
- Butt-Monkey: Berke suffers numerous injuries and pratfalls throughout the movie.
- Camp Straight: Dr Oates is very flamboyant, loves musical theatre and is mentioned to have a wife.
- Cannot Spit It Out: Dennis to Basin.
- Catapult Nightmare: Berke after the opening credits.
- Chekhov's Gag: The defecated punch at the party causes one of the performers to fall ill, requiring Dennis to replace him last-minute.
- Chekhov's Gunman: Minor example, but Allison's seemingly insignificant friend Maggie ends up being caught with Striker by her.
- Cleaning Up Romantic Loose Ends: Berke's friend Dennis and Kelly's friend Basin hook up, as do Felix and Dora Lynn.
- Composite Character:
- Berke as the protagonist is firstly the Lysander equivalent. Secondly he has some elements of Demetrius in that he spends a good portion of the story pursuing a girl who won't return his affections. Thirdly as the Butt-Monkey who suffers a lot of pratfalls (and a terrible actor who ends up cast in the lead role) he is Bottom.
- The Lysander, Hermia, Demetrius and Helena equivalents star in the Show Within a Show (which being A Midsummer Night's Dream itself instead of Pyramus & Thisbe has more characters) whereas in the source material they just watch it along with the other wedding guests.
- Dr Forest Oates is ostensibly Quince, the director of the wedding tableau (now a school play director). But he also has elements of Oberon in that he comically abuses people throughout the story.
- Felix is a combination of Puck (the mischievous meddler who causes the protagonists strain) and Egeus, as the obstructive family member preventing the Official Couple from being together.
- Convenient Slow Dance: Inverted when the generic moderate-tempo background music gets turned up to high-tempo music the second a character asks another to dance.
- Credits Gag: The end credits drop this lovely little disclaimer:"No animals were harmed in the making of this film. However, we did manage to sprain two ankles, break one wrist, squirt one extra in the eye with chili and drive our UPM into insanity."
- Cultural Translation: Demetrius in the play was a man of noble birth. Here his equivalent Striker was in a successful Boy Band. Hermia likewise was a rich heiress who now becomes the school's Alpha Bitch. The wedding tableau of the play becomes a Totally Radical school musical version of A Midsummer Night's Dream itself with the characters cast in their corresponding roles.
- Cute Clumsy Girl: Exaggerated with Dora Lynn, who is a beautiful blonde...and also a walking catastrophe. On her date with Berke she causes Disaster Dominoes that lead to the restaurant being set on fire.
- Decomposite Character:
- Titania is represented by two characters; Dr Forest Oates's assistant Jessica is the one who gets repeatedly one-upped by him. Dora Lynn has her role as the one who makes a fool of herself and ends up in an embarrassing situation with a guy she doesn't know. Additionally the stripper played by Carmen Electra could count due to how she ends up dominating Berke for a bit.
- There are more than just five players here - although only Basin, Dennis and Peter are named and featured.
- Duet Bonding: The way Berke and Kelly get close.
- Elaborate University High: The school grounds are absurdly nice, including a pool with apparent stadium seating.
- Embarrassing Nickname: Steve really doesn't like being called "Little Steve," but his halfhearted complaints fail to dissuade anyone.
- Family-Friendly Stripper: In order to get a PG-13 rating, the strip club is less explicit than originally intended, resulting in this.
- Girl Next Door: Kelly is this in contrast to the more charismatic and outgoing Allison.
- Groin Attack: A female version courtesy of Striker's accidentally thrown nunchucks.Dr. Oates: Keep icing your front-bum! Swelling continues when you don't ice!
- High-School Sweethearts: Berke and Allison were said to be "the quintessential high school couple", and Berke wants to get back together.
- Hot for Teacher: Peter Wong for Dr. Oates, apparently.
- I Just Shot Marvin in the Face: Kelly waves a crossbow around in front of Berke, believing it to be a prop, and it goes off and shoots him in the arm.
- "I Want" Song: Kelly's song "Dream of Me" in the play functions as this for both her and her character Helena - both wanting their beaus to fall for them.
- Imagine Spot: All of Berke's dream sequences, plus one with Dr. Oates where he conducts to hobos.
- I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: Allison is remarkably accepting of Berke getting together with Kelly.
- The Klutz: Felix tries to set Berke up with Dora Lynn, a hot girl who happens to be one in a ''big'' way.
- Ms. Fanservice: Carmen Electra as a dominatrix and in a Gold Bikini in the credits.
- The Musical: Dr. Desmond Oates, the drama teacher, wrote a rock-musical adaptation of A Midsummer Night's Dream, which includes such classics as "Fun to be a Fairy" and "Pocketful of Dreams." And is hilarious.
- My Sister Is Off-Limits: Felix acts like this toward Kelly, which becomes problematic when Berke starts showing interest... Subverted in the end when Felix grows to accept it.
- Mythology Gag: Kelly's heartfelt performance of "Dream of Me" is possibly a reference to how some productions have Flute turn out to be a great actor and make Thisbe's final speech a good one.
- Narm: In-universe. The music and choreography for the play at the end is so bad, the audience can't help but laugh.
- Not-So-Fake Prop Weapon: Kelly thinks the crossbow she finds in the prop room is a non-functioning prop weapon. She's proven wrong when she accidentally shoots Berke in the arm with it.
- Off the Rails: Their version of Midsummer Night's Dream ends with Lysander and Helena getting together.
- Open-Minded Parent: Berke's parents are hosts on a sex talk show, much to Berke's chagrin.
- Pair the Spares: At the end. Berke's friend Dennis finally gets Kelly's best friend Basin, and Felix nets Dora Lynn.
- Phrase Catcher: "Put your hand down, Little Steve!"
- School Play: Obviously the climax of the film.
- Serenade Your Lover: Perhaps as a parody/homage to 10 Things I Hate About You, Berke does this to Allison with the song "Allison"... after they broke up. And he's drunk.
- She Is All Grown Up: Allison at the start of the movie (consider she and Berke used to "play doctor")
- Show Within a Show: The play, naturally.
- Slapstick: Jessica gets hit in the crotch with nunchuks, and Dr Forest Oates's abuse of her is played for comedy. Dora Lynn also suffers numerous pratfalls, including getting hit by a car. Lastly, the nurse gets hit by her falling cast.
- Small Name, Big Ego: Dr. Oates again, who claims to have nearly composed a song with Diana Ross (what he means is she stepped on his cassette as she walked past a media frenzy).
- Small Reference Pools: Pretty well everyone who went to an English-speaking school has read the original play. (If you haven't, no, we don't care.)
- Soundtrack Dissonance: The opening credits sequence begins right after Allison dumps Berke and features an elaborately choreographed song and dance rendition of... Love Will Keep Us Together.
- Stylistic Suck: Certain parts of the school play - particularly Helena's original "love song".
- Sudden Musical Ending: Sure, the movie is about a stage musical, but the big song and dance at the end take place after the show's over.
- Unrequited Love Switcheroo: Berke spends most of the movie pining after Allison, but it's only as he becomes attracted to Kelly that she tries to get back together with him. It doesn't work.
- Urine Trouble: Berke as Lysander gets peed on by a horse during an Imagine Spot.
- Vomit Indiscretion Shot: One of the guests at the Wild Teen Party pukes in the punch bowl.
- Walking Disaster Area: Terrible things just seem to happen around Dora Lynn... at one point resulting in her falling into a coma for five years.
- What the Fu Are You Doing?: Striker pulls out a pair of nunchucks to intimidate Berke, leading him to shout, "Who keeps nunchucks in their pants?!"
- What the Hell Is That Accent?: In-Universe, Striker's accent is described as "sounding like Madonna."
- Wild Teen Party: Felix organizes one... at Berke's house... without Berke's knowledge... though one of the key aspects is averted: While Berke's parents walk in, they aren't mad he had a party, they're upset they didn't know or they would've sprung for a DJ.
- With Friends Like These...: Allison's friend Maggie has No Sympathy for Berke after Allison dumps him - even when Allison herself feels bad about the lousy way she treated him. It's perhaps not surprising when she's caught kissing Striker at the party.
- Your Other Left: Unsurprisingly, stage directions can get confusing.Dr. Desmond Forest Oates: What direction do you think "left" is? See, because if you go with your instinct and reverse it, I think we have something happening. How difficult is this? I'm so alone, I think.
