Truth be told, I wasn't keen on viewing Eating Out 2 when it played at the Portland Gay and Lesbian Film Festival, mostly because - not to put too fine a point on it - I absolutely abhorred the original and thought it was an coarse, overrated, and excruciatingly dull hunk of vitriolic idiocy. I enjoy sarcasm when it's the icing on the cake, or the dressing on the salad. Unfortunately, the original Eating Out was an assaultive, self-impressed cacophony of alarming pseudo-rape scenes, caustic one-liners, and hateful stereotypes. There was NO cake, NO salad; watching it was like trying to eat a bucket of Caesar dressing with a spoon. However, I had a free pass to see the sequel and my friends were going, so I caved in and brought a flask (just in case the going got rough). Unexpectedly, the going never got rough at all; it was refreshingly good-humored, charming, and well-written. Imagine my surprise.<br /><br />Thankfully, the sequel eschews the off-putting, grand guinol theatrics of the original in favor of a warmer, funnier, more humane approach to comedy. Even characters I hated the first time around were more appealing in this one. And, thankfully, this was no sapfest - the "funnier, warmer, and more humane" parts were nicely complemented with snarkiness (COMPLIMENTED, not "drenched in"). I also found it surprisingly well-paced (due, I'm sure, to the new writer/director who apparently learned a thing or two about tempo and rhythm from years of working as an editor). All in all, a great movie - and certainly more enjoyable than Running with Scissors, an A-list, "classy" gay film which bored me to tears the same weekend.