This is my first movie review in my “movie year countdown”. To read more about that check out my first Spout filmblog entry.
Art School Confidential
I've been a fan of Terry Zwigoff as a director since Crumb. Ghost World probably being my favorite, yet Bad Santa with a script idea by the Coen brothers I believe is the one that gives me the most laughs. When I saw that Zwigoff would be working with Daniel Clowes again, I had high hopes.
Apparently a lot of other people did as well. Art School Confidential received some harsh criticism, seemingly more harsh than it would have been had it not been for the inevitable comparison to Ghost World. The reviews frightened me because I seemed to be initially in the same boat as many of those reviewers. All of those so harsh on this film seemed to be huge supporters of Zwigoff's previous work as well. It seems because of that reason many people reacted so excessively negatively to something that didn’t live up to their expectations. I however generally seem to react in an opposite fashion. When I feel an affiliation with a filmmaker after becoming infatuated with several of their past works, I am not more turned off when they eventually produce a work that doesn't seem to initially affect me quite as strongly. On the contrary, I give the filmmaker more of the benefit of the doubt, if that phrase applies at all in this situation. I try to look harder through the film for something that will appeal to me more than I would with another film. Perhaps this seems naive or not objective, but once I feel a connection with an artist, it is very difficult for me to turn away so quickly when they produce something not immediately familiar.
A friend of mine mentioned it was one of those movies where all of the funniest parts were already in the trailer. That may be true actually. However that is only a bad thing when the movie is marketed as what it actually is. A lot of times with the films of more subversive filmmakers working in the Hollywood system, this kind of marketing takes place. Marketing departments seem to only recognize a few certain types of comedy genres for instance. I don't think I laughed too much during this movie actually (probably all but one or two of the times I did were at lines given by Malkovich). I recognized that the movie conformed to many conventions of those trite teen comedies that seem to think they are going above the stereotypes by pointing them out to us. But I think this movie was aware of that genre as well, going beyond it at times by merely indulging in it. And I think Zwigoff has done this in his past two films as well. For instance, Bad Santa although highly irreverent tacks on a sort of unrealistic happy ending, not because I feel that the filmmakers had succumbed to the convention of that genre, but to point out how ridiculous the convention was in comparison to the rest of the film. Granted, the sensation does not hit as often in Art School Confidential, but it is still present.
I think part of its failure in that area is due to the performance of many of the younger members of the cast. John Malkovich and Jim Broadbent are fantastic. But the two leads and much of the supporting cast almost do seem to think they are in one of those typical teen comedies. At any rate they don't seem to bring the same kind of honesty that Zwigoff seemed to be able to cull from Thora Birch and Scarlett Johansson in Ghost World. This seems to be the reason for the significantly lower lack of sympathy that I was able to invest in any character in this movie over that one. There was more of a detached appreciation in this situation rather than a real pathos in the other. I suppose it may also be the fault of the script as well.
And although it might not be a completely unfamiliar character, Nick Swardson was perfect as the obvious gay guy who keeps introducing non sequiturs just to remind people about how he supposedly has a girlfriend.
Not the worst movie to start off my little "movie year countdown" experiment I suppose.
The obligatory score: 8/10 stars