**contains spoilers**
This movie COULD have been something... it could have been one of those teen-angsty guilty pleasure movies that are totally bad, but fun to watch (like "Crime and Punishment in Suburbia", "Ginger Snaps", or "Girl", which also stars Dominique Swain...perhaps she's fast becoming the queen of bad teen B-movies?). Anyway, the premise is allright: it's shocking, sure, but it's supposed to be. Three private school stoner-girls decide that they are tired of feeling vulnerable and "hunted" by men; in order to put men in the same position, they decide to meet one prize specimin on the sly and have sex with him at gunpoint. Their plan doesn't really work, for obvious reasons (the guy's too "scared" to perform), but when word gets out that he was almost raped, his jerk-o guy friends are (naturally!) not worried, but turned on. Now, three girls trying to "rape" men and falsely empower themselves (in order to rid themselves of the vulnerablity all women feel) might have been interesting to watch...but after the initial group hold-up the movie divovles into about a dozen different story lines, none of which make sense whatsoever. One girl mopes around after her distant boyfriend. Another girl--the loose cannon--starts to obsess about the gun. The main girl flirts back and forth between a gay musician (the scene in the bar, where the lipsyncing by the musician is SO obvious, is truly priceless) and her child-hood best friend, the class dork who got suddenly studly during senior year. This goes on for awhile...things gets boring and convoluted. What happened to the girls Revolution? The big gang activity I was promised? It never really enters into the picture again as I was faced with some of the worst acting and writing I've seen in a loooong time. "Jeremy" the good-boy friend of Jefferson, the main character, is one of the worst actors I've ever seen! In his eyes you can see the moments where he is quietly begging the director to hold his hand. Plus, the girls always seem to wear some kind of weird Joker-like makeup. WHY? Is this supposed to make them look wild? But none of this badness can top the ending....which is one of the most poorly edited, confusing scenes ever filmed. It goes like this: Jefferson goes into the dorm bathroom to set off the smoke alarm with her lighter. Oops! She suddenly falls and we see a curtain catch on fire! A curtain in a bathroom?? It could have been a shower curtain..but even so, what else is there to burn. All I saw was tile. It doesn't matter, because the next thing we see is the bathroom in flames! Jefferson is screaming, and rips off her dress (was it burning? huh?). Karen, the bad girl with the gun, is lying on the floor surrounded by flames, crying--wait a minute, how'd she get there? "GIVE ME YOUR HAND", Jefferson shouts (seriously!). "I'll be fine, go save yourself," Karen yells. Jefferson runs out of the bathroom in her underwear, wailing and screaming at the firemen to save Karen.
All I could think as I saw this scene was WHY? WHY? WHY? I was so busy being stunned by the badness of it that I more or less missed the ending, so I will spare you that. I will sum up by saying that if you rent "Ghost World" and see the trailer for "The Smokers" (as I did), and see that Thora Birch is in both movies...do NOT assume the movies are at all on an equal parr. "Ghost World", however, is definitly worth your time. Rent that instead.
This movie COULD have been something... it could have been one of those teen-angsty guilty pleasure movies that are totally bad, but fun to watch (like "Crime and Punishment in Suburbia", "Ginger Snaps", or "Girl", which also stars Dominique Swain...perhaps she's fast becoming the queen of bad teen B-movies?). Anyway, the premise is allright: it's shocking, sure, but it's supposed to be. Three private school stoner-girls decide that they are tired of feeling vulnerable and "hunted" by men; in order to put men in the same position, they decide to meet one prize specimin on the sly and have sex with him at gunpoint. Their plan doesn't really work, for obvious reasons (the guy's too "scared" to perform), but when word gets out that he was almost raped, his jerk-o guy friends are (naturally!) not worried, but turned on. Now, three girls trying to "rape" men and falsely empower themselves (in order to rid themselves of the vulnerablity all women feel) might have been interesting to watch...but after the initial group hold-up the movie divovles into about a dozen different story lines, none of which make sense whatsoever. One girl mopes around after her distant boyfriend. Another girl--the loose cannon--starts to obsess about the gun. The main girl flirts back and forth between a gay musician (the scene in the bar, where the lipsyncing by the musician is SO obvious, is truly priceless) and her child-hood best friend, the class dork who got suddenly studly during senior year. This goes on for awhile...things gets boring and convoluted. What happened to the girls Revolution? The big gang activity I was promised? It never really enters into the picture again as I was faced with some of the worst acting and writing I've seen in a loooong time. "Jeremy" the good-boy friend of Jefferson, the main character, is one of the worst actors I've ever seen! In his eyes you can see the moments where he is quietly begging the director to hold his hand. Plus, the girls always seem to wear some kind of weird Joker-like makeup. WHY? Is this supposed to make them look wild? But none of this badness can top the ending....which is one of the most poorly edited, confusing scenes ever filmed. It goes like this: Jefferson goes into the dorm bathroom to set off the smoke alarm with her lighter. Oops! She suddenly falls and we see a curtain catch on fire! A curtain in a bathroom?? It could have been a shower curtain..but even so, what else is there to burn. All I saw was tile. It doesn't matter, because the next thing we see is the bathroom in flames! Jefferson is screaming, and rips off her dress (was it burning? huh?). Karen, the bad girl with the gun, is lying on the floor surrounded by flames, crying--wait a minute, how'd she get there? "GIVE ME YOUR HAND", Jefferson shouts (seriously!). "I'll be fine, go save yourself," Karen yells. Jefferson runs out of the bathroom in her underwear, wailing and screaming at the firemen to save Karen.
All I could think as I saw this scene was WHY? WHY? WHY? I was so busy being stunned by the badness of it that I more or less missed the ending, so I will spare you that. I will sum up by saying that if you rent "Ghost World" and see the trailer for "The Smokers" (as I did), and see that Thora Birch is in both movies...do NOT assume the movies are at all on an equal parr. "Ghost World", however, is definitly worth your time. Rent that instead.
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