I endured hours and hours of movie watching and bags of popcorn all in the name of the pure scientific research it took to compile this article. So, start thinking of what a drum roll sounds like. Do you hear it? Good, because I am now going to present the definitive list of the best college movies of all time.
(And, if for some reason you disagree, just check out the official-looking chart I made with categories I arbitrarily decided upon. You can’t argue with a chart.)

5. “Accepted” (2006)
After their roles in “Accepted,” Jonah Hill went on to star in “Superbad,” Blake Lively took her talents to “Gossip Girl,” and Justin Long, well, he’s in those Mac commercials. Because he is afraid to tell his parents about getting rejected from every school he applied to, Bartleby (Long) creates a fake college Web site for the South Harmon Institute of Technology (S.H.I.T.), and pretends to have been accepted there. But then, rejected students from all over apply to S.H.I.T., and through a computer malfunction, are accepted. Eventually the whole scheme unravels, they end up in court, and Bartleby gives a heartfelt speech about the merits of alternative forms of education. And even though he gets away with this, I do not suggest leasing an old, rundown asylum, hiring Lewis Black as a dean and starting your own university at the age of 18.

4. “Back to School” (1986)
In this hilarious film, Rodney Dangerfield plays a wealthy businessman (he owns a chain of “Tall and Fat” stores) before deciding to go back to school after visiting his son, Gordon, in college. Dangerfield somehow worked most of his stand-up routine into the dialogue of this movie: “I think I’m attracted to teachers. Yeah, I took out an English teacher. That didn’t work out at all. I sent her a love letter…She corrected it!” And, if that’s not enough reason to watch, Robert Downey Jr. appears in one of his earliest roles as Gordon’s anarchist roommate with blue and maroon streaked hair, often clad in a pirate shirt, parachute pants and a trench coat . The film culminates in a diving competition, in which Dangerfield—and by Dangerfield I mean a horrendously obvious body double—performs the dangerous Triple Lindy. You’ll be a pretty satisfied viewer as you watch the credits fittingly roll to Aretha Franklin’s “Respect.”

3. “Old School” (2003)
Remember when going to a movie starring Will Ferrell and Vince Vaughn automatically meant “Lizzing”? (Note: If you get this reference, please write for us.) No? Well, it has been a while. But, throw in that “Old School” DVD, watch Ferrell, Vaughn and Luke Wilson start a fraternity and take on Jeremy Piven, and laugh so hard you whiz for the better part of 90 minutes. And, with the help of this film, Will Ferrell became one of the most quoted cultural texts in history—second only to the Bible. Yup, I’m pretty sure it goes God, Will Ferrell and then Shakespeare. I have a chart backing this up somewhere…

2. “Revenge of the Nerds” (1984)
When the Alpha Betas accidentally burn down their house, its brothers take over the freshman dorms forcing all the other residents, which include the nerds, to live in gym. After they get rejected from every on-campus fraternity and become fed up with stray basketballs interrupting their chess games, Louis, Gilbert, Poindexter, Booger, and Takashi petition and are unwillingly accepted into a national, and historically African American fraternity: Lambda Lambda Lambda. But, after still not getting any respect (sorry, I’ve been watching a lot of Rodney Dangerfield lately), the Tri-Lambs realize they have to relinquish the Alpha Betas control of the Greek Council by winning the Greek Games. And, they do so with a musical act so professional, so enthralling, so ’80s, it puts the Alpha Betas’ skit to shame. Check out the awesome, original version at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kx-g26tjFFM, or a hilarious, updated, animated homage to this great movie scene at http://www.hulu.com/watch/73581/family-guy-talent-show.

1. “Animal House” (1978)
The first and the best, “Animal House” introduced us to toga parties, sweatshirts that say COLLEGE and Kevin Bacon. Animal House has made it on two of the American Film Institute’s Top 100 lists and into the National Film Registry. Harold Ramis (arguably Wash. U.’s most notable alum—because fame and celebrity trump Nobel Prize every time) co-wrote the script and based some of the movie on his experiences at our own Zeta Beta Tau fraternity. More importantly, though, “Animal House” imparts one of life’s hardest lessons: If life hands you lemons, do you just give up? No. You invite your favorite band over, grab some bed sheets and beer, and throw a blowout.