Shelley (Anna Faris) just loves being a Playboy Bunny and dreams of being the next centerfold. She hopes she'll get that from Hef as her birthday gift next month, but instead, she gets a cold letter stating that at 29, she is too old and must vacate the mansion. So she leaves with the old beater she came there in and the clothes on her back, however skimpy they may be, and she sets out to make her way in the world.
She stumbles upon sorority row at the local college and sees a popular sorority house as her ideal living quarters, since it's so much like "the Mansion." But the house mothers on the row turn their noses up at Shelley and her trashy ways. But then she finds the Zeta house, a motley crew of socially stifled girls who are about to lose their chapter status as a sorority unless they snag a house mother and 30 new pledges, and pronto. So Shelley steps in to see what she can do, but her task will not be easy. You've got the smart girl, Natalie (Emma Stone); the amazon girl who has some lumberjack-like qualities, Carrie-Mae (Dana Goodman); the pregnant girl, Harmony (Katherine McPhee); the excruciatingly shy girl who texts her fellow sorority sisters from a closet, Lilly (Kiely Williams); the awkward girl who wears a metal back brace, although she has long since healed, Joanne (Rumer Willis); and the tough girl, Mona (Kat Dennings). When they finally get cleaned up, plucked and re-dressed, they are all pretty darn cute, but it's a really funny process.
In order to attract pledges, the girls try to raise money for the house, starting with a "sexy" car wash. While it isn't too sexy, Shelley does meet Oliver (Colin Hanks, My Mom's New Boyfriend), who is the administrator of a local nursing home and they begin dating. But when Shelley tries to please him with the tips she's shared with the girls, it backfires since he is interested in who she is as a person, not the Bunny she looks like. When Zeta house finally gets popular and the pledges are coming by the droves, a rival sorority sets out to destroy Zeta. Can Shelley save the day? You betcha!
I really enjoyed The House Bunny. Sure, it had some cheap jokes, but overall I thought it was really cute. Anna Faris is one of those physical comediennes and while she certainly showed how hot she was in this role, she is not afraid to mock herself and that's why I like her so much. Seeing Hugh Hefner and his "Girls Next Door" in several scenes was really funny as well. Adam Sandler is the bank behind this movie, so if you like those types of movies, you'll probably enjoy this one as well. While it's not the most high-brow of humor out there, it doesn't have nearly the potty-humor level that a typical Adam Sandler movie (that he stars in, like Zohan for instance) would have. There are a number of featurettes for fans, on everything from the making-of, to the character of Shelley and Anna Faris' interpretation of her, and even one on the real "Girls Next Door." Fans of Playboy culture should get a kick out of those for sure. While I don't think this is one of those movies that begs to be seen on high-def, it did look and sound really good on Blu-ray. Check it out if you want a few laughs.
