Spring Breakers

Spring Breakers is one of those films, you keep wanting to switch off, but have to get to end, it's not exactly a good film, but the story is such that you have to know what comes next.

It's so outrageously over the top, that it pretty much belongs in the fantasy genre, however there are a few concepts which are sadly all too realistic.

James Franco is good, but is like a parrot with gold teeth, he repeats many lines over and over. Selina Gomez does a fair job.

Nonsense, but watchable, the ending is at least bold. 6/10

Can someone explain to me why SPRING BREAKERS was in the comedy section of my local department store? I can only imagine how many people saw this movie sitting on the shelf with it's cover portraying Selena Gomez, Vanessa Hudgens, Ashley Benson, Rachel Korine, and James Franco in beach-mode and thought, "Well this movie looks like a fun time! It's like THE HANGOVER for the Disney crowd!" I am, of course, assuming that the majority of people buying movies from my local department stores are fools who aren't familiar with movie ratings or aware of movie reviews. And I'm pretty sure I'm right. Anyway, SPRING BREAKERS is not a comedy and, if it is, I missed something somewhere. This movie is a 90 minute hallucination and a rough one. It centers on four longtime friends: Candy (Hudgens), Brit (Benson), Cotty (Korine), and Faith (Gomez). Spring Break has arrived and their too poor to leave campus when everyone heads down south to the beaches of Florida for a week of insane debauchery. We receive our first hint that these girls aren't quite right when Candy, Brit, and Cotty decide to rob an all-night chicken shack for their Spring Break funds. From there, it's beaches, booze, and bongs as the girls party it up until their arrested in a narcotics bust when they're in the wrong place at the wrong time. Enter Alien…a wannabe gangster who makes his living dealing drugs and robbing spring-breakers. He bails out the girls and enlists them to join him in business, and it all goes nuts from there.

SPRING BREAKERS isn't so much a film as it is an experience. It's a visual journey, popping with neon color and thumping with an electronic soundtrack, that won't settle with most average viewers. I had a friend that wanted to see this movie purely for the bikini-clad stars but I warned him against it because I didn't want to hear the eventual complaints that he had no idea what was going on. While I'm totally cool with helping others experience new movies and different styles of filmmaking, I know there's a line and, in this instance, that line is filmmaker Harmony Korine. There is a story present in SPRING BREAKERS but it's done in such a unique and mind-bending fashion that I guarantee it'll turn a lot of people off. Personally, I enjoyed it. After I first watched it, it didn't take some processing on my part and multiple viewings have only made me appreciate it more. I'm a newbie when it comes to Harmony Korine's previous work. I've never seen KIDS or GUMMO but I've heard enough about them to know I need to check them out at some point. For now, SPRING BREAKERS is my first exposure to his work and it's got my attention. It pits a dark crime story against the vibrant energized atmosphere of the crazy college world of Spring Break. At least, the Spring Break you've seen on MTV…drunk, sexually jack-up college students going totally insane.

This is a movie about evil people. Seriously, all but one person in this movie is a sociopath. The only objectively good person in the movie bails as soon as things start going sour. The most fun is watching the dark side of these girls slowly reveal themselves as the movie goes on. You start to wonder who's really the one being manipulated: these girls or Alien? You know they're not your average college hotties early on when you see how easily crime comes to them, but you don't realize how cold they can be. Despite the girls' rapid descent into the seedier side of Spring Break, the violence isn't over-the-top here. The nudity is…so, you know, this really isn't for the actual longtime fans of people like Hudgens and Gomez. This is their attempt at breaking free from their Disney Channel roots. Hudgens had some success with her turn in SUCKER PUNCH but this secures it. I'm pretty sure pot-smoking and threesomes are a surefire way to bust out of that mold. Gomez doesn't go as nuts here but she's still doing her best to be seen as an actual actress. The performances are pretty good for what they are. James Franco has been receiving a lot of praise for his role as Alien. Honestly, he annoyed me the first time I watched the movie. Horribly. But it wasn't his performance, it's just that people like the grate on my nerves. Franco does a great job here, and it's one of his most strange performances.

SPRING BREAKERS isn't for everyone and I'd hope most people would know what they're settling in for if they decide to watch it. It's a gritty, surreal film with some nice eye candy and a foreboding atmosphere playing against the Spring Break wonderland we all envision when we think of college co-eds going nuts. It's a refreshing change from the usual mainstream release, even if it can be a little frustrating to watch at times.

Very creative stunning shots. Watching the violence and crime scenes mixed in with the spring break experience, brought back that sense of shock I felt as a kid watching spring breakers party for the first time. Lots of beautiful girls and there's a sense of comedy and irony. I loved when the heavy gangster is playing Britney Spears on the piano.

Spring Breakers (2012)

* 1/2 (out of 4)

Four college friends don't have the money for spring break so three of them decide to hold up a restaurant. Now with the money they head down to Florida to drink and experience life but soon they run into a gangster (James Franco) and their future hits a bumpy road. I understand SPRING BREAKERS is getting mixed reviews but I'm going to just flat out say that I hated the picture. I thought it was a rather confusing mess with unlikeable and annoying characters, a horrid story and an ending that's so bad that I really wanted to scream at the top of my lungs. Director Harmony Korine makes 90% of the film about style as we get all sorts of strange camera shots, bizarre editing and slow motion shots of bodies giggling and for the life of me I can't understand the point. It certainly doesn't add anything to the story but I will admit it was a "new" way to tell this type of story. With that said, just because it's new doesn't mean it's good and in fact it's just downright annoying. Even worse is the so-called story, which I've heard from some was supposed to be a satire while others appear to be taking it very serious. To me it wasn't clear what the director was trying to do with the material but if we were supposed to like these characters that certainly doesn't happen. I'd say they're all rather hate worthy but at the same time if we were supposed to hate them then the film really lets all of them off easy. The ending was just a downright joke and whatever "meaning" we're supposed to take from it is even worse. The film's selling point seems to be the "Disney Girls Gone Wild" aspect as Selena Gomez, Vanessa Hudgens, Ashley Benson and Heather Morris all tease up the screen. Performance wise they're fine but their characters are just so bad who cares about anything else? Franco chews up the scenery as if he's the son of Max Cady (the Robert DeNiro character in CAPE FEAR) but it's hard to take the character too serious. Again, I understand some are finding deep, haunting meanings to this film but to me it's just a complete joke from start to finish. If you want to see a much better movie about social media and today's culture then check out GOD BLESS America.

Faith, played by Selema Gomez, and her three very close friends plan to escape their boring college dorm lives to attend a massive Spring Break party. In order to pay for their getaway, her three friends commit an unthinkable act of terror. Their Spring Break vacation turns out to be a non-stop party of drunken drug use and sexual perversion that lands them in prison. This is when Alien, played by James Franco, bails them out and a new type of party begins.

With a dub-step softcore porn music video opening sequence, it is uncertain if Spring Breakers is glorifying the demoralizing activities portrayed or if it is a satire. Even when the film is not flashing to what looks like stock footage of a Girls Gone Wild Spring Break special and we are with the girls, the framing seems to have been done by a sex addict. This will be one of the most uncomfortable experiences Selema Gomez's fans will ever experience. For parents, this will be an absolute nightmare. Younger male audiences, on the other hand, will think they've found their new favorite movie. When the girls are introduced to Alien the film feels like it gets a new director. The feeling of a Girls Gone Wild narrative feature film is lost and we are filled with a great sense of dread. Who is this guy who calls himself Alien? We even find ourselves afraid to find out what he has planned for these young girls he has bailed out of prison.

As we continue through the second half of the film, it becomes very clear that we are in fact watching a satire. A horrific and effective satire. This is done though exposing the character of Alien and much credit must be given to James Franco, this is him at his best. Through the course of the film we go from fearing him, to laughing at him, to feeling sorry for him. The film is worth watching just for Franco's performance. The girls do an excellent job as well. These are easily two of the most frightening female characters ever put on-screen.

Spring Breakers is written and directed by Harmony Korine, the writer of Kids and director of Gummo. If you've seen anything he has written or directed you already know what you are in for. It has the core of a Natural Born Killers story wrapped in layers of what would be if Terrence Malick directed Girls Gone Wild.

What ends up becoming an annoying distraction is the repetition of dialogue we hear over and over again, playing in a loop. It's understood we are in the girl's shoes, things are spiraling out of control and the editing helps get that across. Some of it works but in the end, we've heard the same things so many times it is as if Korine is hammering the message of his satire into our heads, almost desperate to prove it has a point. Through the story it's meaning is made clear, no reason to over-use certain Malick-like editing techniques to over-state what the story has already made obvious.

The core story is genius. The way in which the story is told is split between things that play out like a master at work and a new filmmaker still experimenting.