Film Review: Crazy/Beautiful (2001)
Most Hollywood teen films in past few decades belonged to the genres of comedy of horror. Teen dramas that were trying to deal with teen issues in serious way were relatively rare. One such example can be found in Crazy/Beautiful, 2001 film directed by John Stockwell.
Main character is Nicole Oakley (played by Kirsten Dunst), teenage daughter of US congressman Tom Oakley (played by Bruce Davison) who lives in affluent Los Angeles neighbourhood of Pacific Pallisades. Carlos Nuñez (played by Jay Rodriguez) is 17-year old Mexican American who lives in impoverished and crime-infested section of East L.A. Two of them, by chance, attend the same school and fall madly in love with each other. Ethnic, racial and class differences, however, aren’t the worst things that hamper their liaison. It turns out that Nicole has serious psychological issues that manifest themselves in excessive drinking, drug abuse and sexual promiscuity. Carlos, on the other hand, dreams of attending US Naval Academy and becoming pilot, so he spends all the free time studying and hoping that he won’t get bad grades or criminal record.
Motive of interracial romance and class conflict was rarely used in Hollywood teen films. Director John Stockwell took this as an opportunity to make film as different from other teen films as possible. The most notable difference is rather dark and melancholic atmosphere, created by cinematography by Shane Hurlbut that paints Los Angeles as a very cold place. The script by Phil Hay and Matt Manfredi generally avoids most melodramatic cliches. But the best thing about Crazy/Beautiful is cast. Kirsten Dunst, former child actress who was just paving the way for successful career as an adult, was delighted with opportunity to play character so different from lovable “girl next door” and didn’t shy away to stand in front of camera with bad hair or without makeup. Her impressive efforts to play extremely troubled and self-destructive teenager are aided by good work by Bruce Davison who is very good as her broad-minded and well-intentioned father who embodies all virtues of white liberal America. Stockwell’s good intentions were, on the other hand, at odds with Disney, studio that worked very hard to make this film as family-friendly as possible. That meant that drugs, alcohol and irresponsible sex – the very things authors were trying to warn teenagers and parents about – weren’t allowed to be portrayed on screen in meaningful manner. As a result, a lot of content was cut out of the final version, making some plot developments confusing for audience and general impression was further hampered by predictably melodramatic Hollywood-like ending. However, even in this flawed form, this combination of teen romance and socially conscious drama represents more than satisfactory piece of cinema that could be recommended even to the viewers who aren’t big fans of Kirsten Dunst.
RATING: 6/10 (++)
Blog in Croatian https://draxblog.com
Blog in English https://draxreview.wordpress.com/
Leofinance blog https://leofinance.io/@drax.leo
Unstoppable Domains: https://unstoppabledomains.com/?ref=3fc23fc42c1b417
Hiveonboard: https://hiveonboard.com?ref=drax y
Bitcoin Lightning HIVE donations: https://v4v.app/v1/lnurlp/qrcode/drax
Rising Star game: https://www.risingstargame.com?referrer=drax
1Inch: https://1inch.exchange/#/r/0x83823d8CCB74F828148258BB4457642124b1328e
BTC donations: 1EWxiMiP6iiG9rger3NuUSd6HByaxQWafG
ETH donations: 0xB305F144323b99e6f8b1d66f5D7DE78B498C32A7
