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My roomie's girfriend made us rent this film tonight and I am glad she did.
The film which was originally produced for television is from 2002 and if I have understood it correctly it was inspired by a play with the same name. Apparantly the play Bang, Bang, You're Dead has been played by students in schools all over America and I believe it is in some way about the Columbine tragedy. The american memebers probably know more about this than me.
The main character in the film, Trevor (played by Ben Foster), is an outcast that is being bullied by the members of his high school's football team. He's spent the summer in summer school and therapy for seriously threatening to blow up the football team. When he comes back the daily terror continues and he ends up with a group of kids, called Trogs, that spend their free time shooting guns and preparing for a war with the football team, a war that soon becomes reality and that threatens to turn real ugly. At the same time Trevor ends up playing the leading role in a school play - that's right, in the play Bang, Bang, You're Dead - because a new girl in school, Jenny (Jane McGregor), who is also in the play catches his attention. His film teacher, Mr Duncan (Tom Cavanagh), is the one directing the play and he is also the only one who really understands what is going on with Trevor. He knows that Trevor has a talent for acting and since the part is actually about Trevor in a way Mr Duncan appears to be thinking that doing the play will make Trevor realize some things about himself. Because of the topic of the play together with Trevor's past and the worrying things that goes on in school lead to the play being stopped. And when Trevor makes a film about killing one of his enemies, a guy on the football team, things look pretty bad for him. Meanwhile, the Trogs are preparing for the final revenge in the school cafeteria.
The film is about how Trevor who's being abused physically and mentally in school every single day, yelled at by his parents and treated as the root to all evil by most teachers and the other students in school is being driven to commit terrible actions to end his hell. It is about how the cruelty of kids and the ignorance of adults together with the easy access to guns and explosives can and does lead to catastrophic events.
The film that is more than inspired by what happened in Columbine treats that tragedy with great intelligence and understanding for what is really important and without the sensationalism that you would probably expect. You would also expect, because of what the film is about, that it would leave you with a hopeless feeling in your gut, but without any Hollywood cheesyness I was left with a positive vibe in me by this very powerful movie.
The actors, who actually looked like they were high school kids rather than teen models, were all great. Guy Ferland, the director, has really succeed in making everyone do a really inspired job and the main guy, Ben Foster was amazing. (Does this guy look like Justin Timberlake or what?). The script is really good and it delivers a really important message. At the same time it was a very thrilling experience to watch it and it contains several moments filled with suspense.
I saw Donnie Darko the other day and these two films make me wonder if we are killing (physically or intellectually) our greatest talents. There will always be a set norm, something that most people are expected to follow, I guess. But when the norm starts to exterminate everything that is different, then we are really in trouble....
The film which was originally produced for television is from 2002 and if I have understood it correctly it was inspired by a play with the same name. Apparantly the play Bang, Bang, You're Dead has been played by students in schools all over America and I believe it is in some way about the Columbine tragedy. The american memebers probably know more about this than me.
The main character in the film, Trevor (played by Ben Foster), is an outcast that is being bullied by the members of his high school's football team. He's spent the summer in summer school and therapy for seriously threatening to blow up the football team. When he comes back the daily terror continues and he ends up with a group of kids, called Trogs, that spend their free time shooting guns and preparing for a war with the football team, a war that soon becomes reality and that threatens to turn real ugly. At the same time Trevor ends up playing the leading role in a school play - that's right, in the play Bang, Bang, You're Dead - because a new girl in school, Jenny (Jane McGregor), who is also in the play catches his attention. His film teacher, Mr Duncan (Tom Cavanagh), is the one directing the play and he is also the only one who really understands what is going on with Trevor. He knows that Trevor has a talent for acting and since the part is actually about Trevor in a way Mr Duncan appears to be thinking that doing the play will make Trevor realize some things about himself. Because of the topic of the play together with Trevor's past and the worrying things that goes on in school lead to the play being stopped. And when Trevor makes a film about killing one of his enemies, a guy on the football team, things look pretty bad for him. Meanwhile, the Trogs are preparing for the final revenge in the school cafeteria.
The film is about how Trevor who's being abused physically and mentally in school every single day, yelled at by his parents and treated as the root to all evil by most teachers and the other students in school is being driven to commit terrible actions to end his hell. It is about how the cruelty of kids and the ignorance of adults together with the easy access to guns and explosives can and does lead to catastrophic events.
The film that is more than inspired by what happened in Columbine treats that tragedy with great intelligence and understanding for what is really important and without the sensationalism that you would probably expect. You would also expect, because of what the film is about, that it would leave you with a hopeless feeling in your gut, but without any Hollywood cheesyness I was left with a positive vibe in me by this very powerful movie.
The actors, who actually looked like they were high school kids rather than teen models, were all great. Guy Ferland, the director, has really succeed in making everyone do a really inspired job and the main guy, Ben Foster was amazing. (Does this guy look like Justin Timberlake or what?). The script is really good and it delivers a really important message. At the same time it was a very thrilling experience to watch it and it contains several moments filled with suspense.
I saw Donnie Darko the other day and these two films make me wonder if we are killing (physically or intellectually) our greatest talents. There will always be a set norm, something that most people are expected to follow, I guess. But when the norm starts to exterminate everything that is different, then we are really in trouble....
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The novelist does not long to see the lion eat grass. He realizes that one and the same God created the wolf and the lamb, then smiled, "seeing that his work was good".
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They had temporarily escaped the factories, the warehouses, the slaughterhouses, the car washes - they'd be back in captivity the next day but now they were out - they were wild with freedom. They weren't thinking about the slavery of poverty. Or the slavery of welfare and food stamps. The rest of us would be all right until the poor learned how to make atom bombs in their basements.
The novelist does not long to see the lion eat grass. He realizes that one and the same God created the wolf and the lamb, then smiled, "seeing that his work was good".
--------
They had temporarily escaped the factories, the warehouses, the slaughterhouses, the car washes - they'd be back in captivity the next day but now they were out - they were wild with freedom. They weren't thinking about the slavery of poverty. Or the slavery of welfare and food stamps. The rest of us would be all right until the poor learned how to make atom bombs in their basements.
