Clueless

Considering how long removed I am from both the '90s and high school, there's something entirely relatable about Clueless - and I'm as surprised as anyone. Alicia Silverstone is beyond charming and there's plenty of humor in the supporting cast as well (in particular, the late Brittany Murphy, incandescent in her own right). But the dialogue really put me back in that high school mindset, and I think the movie strikes a nice balance between satire and teen fluff. Like Mean Girls, this is a movie that I've dismissed over the years for being shallow, and for the life of me I can't explain why. This is good stuff.

Cher (Alicia Silverstone) is a popular ditz at her local high school in Beverly Hills. She's a spoiled, pampered little princess with all the right social connections and endless wealth. However she has yet to find a man in her life - all the Baldwins (as she and her clique of friends call guys they like) have been taken.

When Cher receives a foreign exchange student, she takes her under her wing and decides to try and find her a boyfriend - ironically without having her own yet. Predictability ensues.

I read "Emma" in early high school as I'm sure most kids did, and the movie puts a clever spin on the tale. Alicia Silverstone is surprisingly good in her role, perfectly playing a blond bombshell without a brain but a good heart - only Reese Witherspoon has done such a good job recently at portraying the west coast bimbos. (No offense to the west coast bimbos out there.) The movie's director, Amy Heckerling, has always been rather reliable on the whole and her direction is solid here - she could have turned "Clueless" into a crude, unfunny sex comedy with little wit or brains, but instead she takes a rather dubious idea for a film and transforms it into a well-made, well-acted, funny, inspired, lively, witty satire.

Much better than expected.

This movie is another one of those feel good pictures you can't go wrong with. It's light and breezy like cruising the boulevard with the top down and it offers lots of laughs to boot.

Amy Heckerling has brought us another winner with a great supporting cast. A young teenage girl coming of age in of all places, Beverly Hills. The lead character, "Cher" played brilliantly by Alicia Silverstone, is a self centered high school girl in the beginning of the picture who's only interests include clothes, cars and credit cards. As the film progresses, she begins to mature and actually begins to care about other people, not to mention her environment. It's worth renting anytime. Just like "European Vacation" it doesn't matter how many times you see it, it still makes you laugh and that's worth it all.

"Let's set 'Emma' in a modern high school!" Does this sound the obvious kind of movie gimmick that everyone uses nowadays? Perhaps, but it's an inspired idea all the same. Jane Austen's characters, and her readers, and the society in which her novels are set, like Jane Austen herself, are HEAVILY conscious of class and social standing. No atmosphere quite so snobbish exists in the modern world. EXCEPT, that is, in the corridors and courtyards of the right kind of high school. And where else in the modern world would you find so many people who seem to spend all their time calling on one another?

I was reminded of how well Heckerling moulded "Emma" to fit a modern setting when I saw the idiotic 1998 version of "Great Expectations", adapted by someone who somehow failed to notice how important all the stuff about class and snobbishness was. It's clear that Heckerling understood her source. She isn't afraid to make changes - even radical changes, if the modern setting requires as much - and no character exists MERELY because they have an analogue in Austen's novel. (The most crucial thing is that the Emma-equivalent be sufficiently charming; and so she is.) The result is a film which is winning and satisfying, whether or not you know anything about the source material.

Director Amy Heckerling knows a thing or two about high school flicks, having directed the highly successful `Fast Times at Ridgemont High'. Heckerling put her talents to work thirteen years later for the next generation of high schoolers, writing and directing this hilarious satire of life at Beverly Hills H.S. Heckerling takes a different approach from `Fast Times', which found its comedy in the absurdity of reality, depicting situations into which teenagers really get themselves. Here Heckerling's comedy mostly comes from mocking the superficiality of the high school `in-crowd'. While this is not the first time this has been done, few have ever done it with such blistering wit. This film became the standard for a spate of 1990's high school flicks set on the west coast that borrowed many of its elements.

The story focuses on Cher Horowitz (Alicia Silverstone), who is the most popular girl at Beverly Hills H.S. Cher seems to be a superficial airhead, but this belies her conniving and manipulative skills at getting what she wants. Superficial yes, airhead no! In a plot derived in part from Jane Austen's `Emma', Cher works behind the scenes to arrange love matches between various students. She even orchestrates a relationship between two teachers to improve their moods so they don't grade so harshly. Like Emma, she is a master of love for everyone but herself.

Heckerling does a fantastic job of presenting what seems on the surface to be a cotton candy story with lightweight characters, but really runs much deeper revealing subtle truths about human nature. Her direction of the fledgling cast is superb, milking every ounce of comedy out of each scene.

Silverstone sparkles in the role, which is probably not far from a reality with which she is very familiar. She actually attended Beverly Hills H.S. with co-star Breckin Meyer, although she didn't graduate due to career commitments (she received a G.E.D.). This film catapulted her to teen prominence with two MTV movie awards and an American Comedy Award as funniest actress in a leading role. She plays Cher with both arrogance and vulnerability, and her comic timing is impeccable. She also has a knack for physical comedy, with a broad range of contorted facial expressions and amusing use of body language. The rest of the teen cast is also great, especially Brittany Murphy as Tai and Breckin Meyer as Travis. Dan Hedaya is also priceless as Cher's work obsessed attorney father.

This film is easy to like. It is a light and funny spoof, but it still has nuance. I rated it an 8/10. For those who enjoy high school comedies, this is required viewing.