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Webposted: April 7, 2002
by: Kay Kellam
This is a movie that evolves and unfolds before your very eyes -- the answers are not always simple, but rather a layered examination of how real people behave. Mistakes are made and in the end a simple mistake can cost a life.
If you saw Cruel Intentions don't merely blow this movie off as just another in the line, these characters have motives, and while it does take a while to figure out who is really feeling what it is very true to life in that respect. Things are not done merely to be cruel, and these characters make the mistakes of youth, which makes it all the more fun to watch.
I came out of there with a good idea of who Hadley was, and what kind of person, she was perhaps the best defined of the lot. I knew a fair amount about all the others -- but never found out the truth, which is perhaps most fitting since the pieces come together for the audience as a sheriff investigates how two girls go from total strangers forced to work together on a sociology project (Lead, Follow or Get out of the Way) to being best friends, to one of them lying in the hospital in a coma.
Pieces are handed out slowly, but in the end they are all lined up for the audience to see exactly how things got out of hand... and it is so easy to believe it could happen that it is almost scary. (If I were still in College I might even think terrifying.)
If you've got an hour and a half to spare... and like movies that unfold before your very eyes and leave you wondering just what are those characters thinking, a good old fashioned character piece with just enough fun and action to keep it moving, then spend that hour and half on your New Best Friend.
(this official synopsis does not exactly match the cut we were shown.)
A deputy sheriff investigates the murder of a college student which is connected to an unusual class project. How Far would YOU go to fit in?
It's January, the start of a new semester at exclusive Colby University
nestled in the Carolina countryside. Near the campus, four young women prepare
themselves for the final semester of their senior year. In her dingy apartment
over the "He's Not Here Tavern," where she lives with her mother,
ALICIA GLAZER (Mia Kirshner)
organizes her school supplies. She is plain as well as poor.
On the other side of town, in an exclusive row house, three beautiful and
privileged young coeds start their day: sensuous HADLEY WESTON (Meredith
Monroe), luxuriates in a bubble bath with a margarita in hand; her
junk-food loving bulemic roommate JULIANNE McINTYRE (Rachel
True) wolfs down a huge bowl of cereal and immediately runs into the
bathroom to throw it up; and oversexed SYDNEY CONNORS (Dominique
Swain) slowly wakes up next to her boyfriend, JOSH (Oliver
Hudson), and some poor townie who is shocked to discover how she spent
the night.
Classes begin and Alicia is paired with Hadley to work on the all-important
sociology class senior thesis project titled, "Lead, Follow or Get Out of
the Way." At first rejected, Alicia is finally accepted into Hadley's
clique where she is introduced to a world of privilege and dangerous thrills.
But her attempts to become one of them ultimately land her in the hospital.
As the local sheriff, ARTIE BONNER (Taye
Diggs), tries to determine the chain of events that led to Alicia's
collapse, his investigation casts a shadow of responsibility over the
untouchable, affluent young women.
...
(C) Kay Kellam, 2001 for PopArtsPlace.com
Prior to having her first novel, A
Life to Di For, published author Kay
Kellam enjoyed a variety of jobs that helped to shape her outlook on the
world, and her profession. more...
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