New(ish) Releases from 2019: Booksmart and Parasite

Booksmart (2019)

Director: Olivia Wilde

A new teen comedy to add to the canon of 21st century-classics.

Booksmart follows in the spiritual footsteps of Superbad by following a crazy day in the life of a couple of close high school friends, Amy (Kaitlyn Dever) and Molly (Beanie Feldstein). Amy and Molly are overachievers who are primed for upper-echelon universities, and they are in their final week of classes before graduating. But once they realize that all of their peers, to whom they had felt academically superior, are also getting into top-notch schools on the strength of skills unknown to the prideful young ladies, massive regret sets in. Namely, that they had wasted some of their high school years studying rather than occasionally cutting lose and having fun with their classmates. In an attempt to remedy this, they decide to go all-out and attend a massive graduation party where they will have all of the fun that they skipped during their previous years of study. Of course, the line to the party quickly becomes anything but straight, and the girls are sent on a rather wild, epic evening of craziness.

While the overall premise and structure of Booksmart aren't particularly novel, it breaks a few barriers by focusing on young ladies who are incredibly smart, funny, and can be every bit as raunchy as their male counterparts. While my 44-year-old self was probably not quite as entertained as a younger person might be, I still found plenty to laugh at and appreciate. The Odyssey-like journey goes through various episodes, some funnier and more creative than others, which keep the pace moving along nicely.

The strength is in the performances of Dever and Feldstein, who are great in their turns as Amy and Molly. I can't imagine that it's easy to pull off uproarious comedy in the same film where two actors need to build some genuine sympathy and heart with the audience, yet these two young stars pull it off.

I don't know that I'll go out of my way to watch this one again, but I could very easily see myself surfing across it, stopping, and staying on for the rest of the ride. At least, at any point in the purely-comedic first two acts. Things get a bit more dramatic in the third (as you would hope for a buddy comedy that aspired to be a bit more than comedy), but it's an entertaining trip worth jumping into at nearly any point.

Parasite (2019)

Director: Boon Jong-Ho

Brilliantly crafted and executed social thriller/dark comedy by a modern Korean master who seems to just keep getting better and better.

Parasite follows young South Korean man Ki-woo and his family, the Kims. The Kims are quite poor, though they all seem to be rather intelligent, if sometimes morally dubious, survivors. Ki-woo takes an opportunity to fill in for a friend as an English tutor to the 15-year old daughter of a very wealthy couple, the Parks. Ki-woo gets the job by lying about his credentials and keeping up a good front to the rather gullible Mrs. Park. The money is so good that Ki-woo finagles jobs for his family members, as well. But once the Kims get deep into the Park's lives, things take a strange turn which jeopardizes the entire scam.

A simple, spoiler-free summary of the premise hardly does this movie justice. As with director Boon's 2013 sci-fi dystopian film Snowpiercer, Parasite has a strong theme revolving around socio-economic class. The interactions both within and between the Kim and Park families say a ton about the relationships between the upper- and middle/lower-tiers on the economic spectrum, not just in South Korea but in any society. This is what elevates the story far above a mere thriller.

And suspense-thriller is what you get on the movie's surface, which it does extremely well. While it takes a bit of time for the mystery and suspense elements to kick in, they hit hard when they do; I guarantee that, if you don't know anything about the movie, then you will never be able to see where some of the twists are taking you.

The Kims, trying to make ends meet by folding pizza boxes.
What might have been completely depressing in another
movie is, in Parasite, comical and revealing.

But, unlike say, an M. Night Shyamalan movie, Parasite goes well beyond its twists for its real impact. As already stated, the plot turns and rising tension serve to do more than simply build drama. They offer sly and sometimes brutal commentary on relations between people of very different means.

One might be tempted to think that Parasite is some horrific, dark tale that will leave one endlessly disturbed, but such is not really the case. Yes, there are dark elements to it, and even some horror elements. But there is also plenty of humor of various types, some dark but some very light. And this range of tones and gags is brought off splendidly by the flawless cast, most notably all four of the Parks - Ki-woo (Choi Woo-sik), Ki-jung (Park So-dam), Chung-sook (Jang, Hye-jin), and Ki-taek (Song Kang-ho). The others are great, but these four charismatic hucksters really make you pull for them and really make you feel the pain when tragedy hits.

I expect Parasite to rake in more than a few major awards (I think it already has, at the time that I write this), as it really is an outstanding movie. If you haven't seen it, I can't recommend it enough. While there are elements that may seem strange to those more accustomed to traditional narratives, if you can go in with an open mind and try to read in between the lines a bit, you won't be disappointed. 

New Release! Eighth Grade (2018)

Director: Bo Burnham

An excellent and amazingly organic, modern "coming of age" movie that eschews the tropes and high polish of all of its popular predecessors.

Eighth Grade follows Kayla (Elsie Fisher), the titular eighth-grader who is struggling through the final few weeks of her 8th-grade year - the final year before the high school years. Though not having a romantic partner, any close friends, and being rather awkward, Kayla creates and releases youtube videos of herself offering life advice on topics such as confidence and "being yourself." She has no siblings and is raised by her single father, who is kind but has a difficult time completely connecting with Kayla.

Written and directed by early teen Youtube star and successful standup comedian Bo Burnham, this movie is one that I feel any modern young person and their parents should watch. Burnham made the wise choice of searching for authenticity in terms of situations and voices with this film, rather than write a tight, unrealistically clever story that makes a grand, artistic or crowd-pleasing statement about "life as a teenager." I think of something like Mean Girls, which is a truly fun film, but hardly a realistic depiction of what most young teens are truly struggling with at this age in a modern, developed society. It's not the John Hughes cliques and "first-world" problems of those movies,Rather, it is the very real contradiction of feeling so very out of place while also feeling the need to put up a front of wisdom and confidence which no person really has in their early teen years. This is what Kayla experiences, and the ubiquity of social media adds an element to the experience that no generation has ever had before. Where other such movies would have Kayla fight through this, "discover inner beauty," and have triumphant one-up moments by movie's end, Eighth Grade doesn't offer such satisfying yet artificial fare. Not many teens have Lindsey Lohan's good looks or her characters' smarts to overcome vicious and shallow peers. Rather, Kayla has little victories and successes which the discriminating viewer will realize won't matter much to the other teens around her, but will mean everything to her.

Like so many in her generation, Kayla uses social media to
appear much more confident and carefree than she
really is. 

I found this movie to be an excellent companion piece to last year's hit Ladybird. That film focuses on a not-particularly-special young woman finishing her final year in high school, learning some important things about herself, and taking the next steps beyond it. Eighth Grade feels similar in general structure. Neither Ladybird nor Kayla has the panache of most Hollywood teen movie protagonists, but they both feel as real as a fictional character can feel. They can be clumsy, awkward, and have a lot of trouble expressing their frustrations at times. But they figure out some important things about themselves and manage to grow from them. By each movie's end, you know that these two characters certainly do not have life figured out, by any means. But they have come up with a few important answers for themselves, and their feet are just a bit steadier than when the movies began. And we the audience can share in those small triumphs.

It can be difficult to craft a movie that both feels timely and manages to capture a more universal sense among a wide range of viewers. I feel that Eighth Grade does this exceptionally well. I have to think that viewers between ages 11 and 18 will see uncomfortably familiar scenarios here, I feel that anyone at least into their fifties will completely understand the internal struggles of Kayla. And even viewers whose middle and high school years predated the 1980s can likely see and empathize with Kayla as she struggles with finding a place for herself, even if it is in a 21st century that bears its own very unique wonders and challenges. 

Before I Die # 545: Clueless (1995)

This is the 545th movie I've watched from the 1,169 movies to "See Before You Die" list that I'm gradually working my way through.

Director: Amy Heckerling

A fairly pleasant little surprise, and certainly a slice of pop culture from my formative years in the 1990s.

This is one of my wife's favorite movies, so she was able to fill me in on the interesting fact that this is a modern comedic adaptation of Jane Austen's Emma. This alone piqued my interest a little more, and I was rewarded with a pretty clever and entertaining movie that I somehow had never previously seen.

The movie follows several months in the life of high school senior Cher, an obliviously wealthy and priveleged teen whose primary concerns are fashion trends, having her way, and occasionally helping those she deems "in need." The film unabashedly wears its place and time on its sleeve, from the fashion aesthetic to the soundtrack to the quirky slang. And few things say "mid-1990s" like Alicia Silverstone, the "It Girl" for a brief period. Fortunately, these dated elements do nothing to diminish the basic story and the humor of the film.

My wife informs me that the story is, indeed, a reasonable facsimile of Jane Austen's classic novel. Cher, like that book's protagonist, is a priveleged rich girl who actually does have a sense of goodness, though it takes her some time to get any kind of true sense of herself and the world around her. Her fumbling ditsiness still makes for some solid humor, even these 20 years after the film's initial release. The script holds up surprisingly well, with plenty of the supporting characters rounding out the  movie nicely. The cast has more than a little to do with this; a young Paul Rudd and Brittney Murphy feature, and veteran Dan Hedaya are just a few of the actors who nail their roles and lines.

Admittedly, I found some of the elements a tad sappy here and there, which is unsurprising for what amounts to a romantic teen comedy. Still, the movie never takes itself seriously enough to invite harsh criticism. The tale is amusing, if slightly familiar.

I have to confer the highest compliment that I can for a movie like this: I enjoyed it. Considering what it is, and the fact that I was expecting to find it a chore to watch, this is high praise.

That's 545 movies seen. Only 624 to go before I can die...