| RATING: | 100% |
| FORMAT: | DVD |
Exceptional revenge comedy featuring the ever excellent Reese WITHERSPOON - ably complemented by an ensemble of superlative character actors. School life in the American West is shown in all its gory detail: Romances between teachers & students; homosexuality; jealousy; social fitting in; and, conflicts between haves & have nots.
This honest depiction of people is ably summed up in the common conflation of morality with ethics, that’s shown, anyway, to be only preaching – not practicing – for most of the movie’s length. The main characters use voiceover to communicate their real thoughts and to show that democratic political life is largely a pointless struggle that only benefits the politicians since it’s not ethical. The only real issue is winning elections, at all costs, not in actually changing anything for the better (or worse). In any event, each character is shown from their own point of view; leaving us to decide whether they are good, bad or just like us.
This veracity is partly a flaw since the comic blandness of most of the characters means the film inhabits a not fully thought out no man’s land between serious drama and laugh out loud comedy. A structural and thematic uncertainty that is largely solved by voiceovers that are often funnier than what we actually see on screen. The attempt to satirize US presidential elections also doesn’t quite strike the right note since this movie is less of a political satire and more of a high school romp about teenage self discovery.
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