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| Title: | Movie Reviews and Discussion |
| Notice: | Please do DIR/TITLE before starting a new topic on a movie! |
| Moderator: | VAXCPU::michaud o.dec.com::tamara::eppes |
|
| Created: | Thu Jan 28 1993 |
| Last Modified: | Thu Jun 05 1997 |
| Last Successful Update: | Fri Jun 06 1997 |
| Number of topics: | 1249 |
| Total number of notes: | 16012 |
1128.0. "Welcome to the Dollhouse" by EVMS::HALLYB (Fish have no concept of fire) Mon Jul 01 1996 14:36
... might better be titled _Square Peg: The Prequel_, at least that would
help SOME people figure out if they wanted to watch the movie. Perhaps it
would help to know it won the grand prize at the 1996 Sundance film festival.
The main character is Dawn Weiner, a 7th-grader (~age 12) at Ben Franklin
Jr. High in New Jersey, not far from NYC. Dawn is the least attractive
girl in the school and is the object of the unrelenting, merciless ridicule
that pre-teens are so good at. At home, Dawn has a little sister Missy who is
quite a cutie who spends her play time pretending to be a ballerina. Dawn
also has an older brother Mark who looks like a teen-age Bill Gates and divides
his time between his PC and his garage band. His ambition is to make it
into a really good college, and his "college resume" is the focal point
of his existence.
Naturally, mom and dad show lots more affection for the other two children
than they show Dawn, who is most in need of support. The movie concentrates
on Dawn's attempts to cope with all the injustices of existence with little
help from her fellow humans. She has a couple opportunities to take out
her frustrations on her little sister and one of them backfires.
The thing is, this movie is a comedy. A lot of Dawn's misfortunes occur in
funny situations, and she isn't the only clumsy kid in the movie. Don't
look for the movie to go anywhere -- Dawn doesn't break up any crime ring or
prevent an assassination -- she just tries to be a good kid in the face of
enormous difficulties. The movie excels in portraying these "difficulties".
Now playing at the Wilton Theatre. Rated R for language.
John
| T.R | Title | User | Personal
Name | Date | Lines |
|---|
| 1128.1 | | EPS::RODERICK | NH - Bienvenue au Construction | Mon Jul 01 1996 16:07 | 9 |
| Siskel and Ebert gave it a thumbs up and thought it felt real. The New
Yorker critic (I forget which, either Terrence Rafferty or Anthony
Lane, http://www.enews.com/magazines/new_yorker/archives where
occasionally they post The Current Cinema) didn't like it. From Siskel
and Ebert's review, it looks pretty brutal, sort of like Janis Ian's
"Seventeen" made into a film except casting a 12 year old instead of a
teenager.
Lisa
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