An average movie

I remember it very well, I saw this movie when it was released and I was just about 15-16 years old. Back then, there was quite a controversy about this directing debut by Larry Clark, who was at the time famous as a photographer. Even though this flick was critically acclaimed, I was personally not completely convinced by the whole thing. I mean, I did like Clark’s directing and the acting from the very young teenagers with no acting experience was quite impressive but, somehow, the whole thing rubbed me in the wrong way. It is not that I was shocked by the content, not really, it is more that, being myself a teenager at the time, I thought that the whole thing was actually really pretentious and gave a really one-sided view about teenagers in this subculture. There was such a lack of nuance, it was rather annoying and, in my opinion, it was above all due to the fact that it was Clark’s debut. Therefore, I enjoyed more his later work like the even more controversial ‘Ken Park’ and I really loved ‘Bully’, by far his best directing effort in my opinion, because Clark seemed to be much in control instead of only slapping you in your face with some controversial teenager behiavor. To conclude, in spite of its flaws, I have to admit it, it remains an intriguing feature and it is worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

6/10