DESPITE ITS TITLE, 'SLACKERS' ABOUNDS WITH TWISTED ENERGY.

Byline: Bob Strauss Film Critic

WHILE THE TITLE ``Slackers'' makes it sound like a sequel to Richard Linklater's seminal ``Slacker'' - and indicates a lack of imagination on the part of this teen sex farce's writer, David H. Steinberg (``American Pie 2'') and director Dewey Nicks (lots of TV commercials) - that's hardly the case here. We'd probably be better off if these guys had kept their sick thoughts to themselves, but imagination-impaired is one thing they're not.

Still don't get that title, though, since everyone in the movie runs around like a perverted and/or criminal dervish, trying to pull off one outlandish scheme or another. If the story has anything to recommend it, it's the sheer twisted energy that's lavished on its occasionally ingenious, usually harebrained and always revolting plotting.

Dave (Devon Sawa), Sam (``Freaks and Geeks'' alum Jason Segel) and Jeff (Michael C. Maronna) are world-class cheaters about to graduate from college with honors and without ever having cracked a book. But it's all put in jeopardy when an obsessive nerd who inaccurately calls himself Cool Ethan (Jason Schwartzman, even more deranged than he was in ``Rushmore'') tumbles onto their final exam scam.

Blackmail ensues, but what Ethan wants tests the three buddies' invasive and persuasive skills to their limits. Ethan is in love with the beautiful Angela (James King, who died so pretty in ``Pearl Harbor''), and he wants the liars to make her like him. Since he's a true panty-stealing, hair-collecting, covertly videotaping deviant, Ethan proves somewhat difficult to talk up. And since handsome Dave is assigned to do most of the talking to Angela, she inevitably becomes much more interested in him than in the geek.

We've come a long way since ``The Courtship of Miles Standish,'' but even a Puritan would recognize the old formula operating in this high-tech, high gross-out version (guess it's not so imaginative after all). First-year film school students will similarly grasp the elementary tricks Nicks employs whenever the narrative paints itself into a corner, such as devolving into music video montages or tossing in obvious dream sequences.

But the director's main tactic is to bring on nonsensical smut. As Angela's roommate, Reanna, ``That '70s Show's'' Laura Prepon is forced to define her character through auto-eroticism and dominatrix posturing. More embarrassing fates, believe it or not, await the film's older actresses Leigh Taylor Young and Mamie Van Doren (!). Cameron Diaz pops up in a fantasy cameo that leaves her dignity comparatively unscathed.

Misogynistic as it is, though, ``Slackers'' saves the bulk of its barbs for poor, icky Ethan. Schwartzman once again proves his expertise at plumbing dicey psychological cesspools as fully and fearlessly as possible. It's not a pretty sight, but it's the one thing that makes ``Slackers'' worth seeing.

``SLACKERS'' Two stars

(Rated R: sex, nudity, language, drug use)

Starring: Devon Sawa, Jason Schwartzman, James King, Jason Segel, Michael C. Maronna, Laura Prepon.

Director: Dewey Nicks.

Running time: 1 hr. 27 min.

Playing: Citywide.

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Dave (Devon Sawa) finds himself falling for the brainy, beautiful Angela in ``Slackers.''