American Teen review

So the doc that got the biggest buzz at Sundance was a film called "American Teen", a film that follows four teenagers through their senior years of high school. What sounds like a glorified episode of MTV's True Life is mostly just that;the film is as poorly structured and, at certain points, obviously fabricated. The story jumps chronologically (April 1st rolls around, yet it's still basketball season?) and lacks any kind of authenticity.

The film's four principal subjects are complete "Break Club" cliches -- there's the nonconformist art girl who dreams of leaving the sleepy Midwestern town for San Francisco; The bitchy blond bombshell who is just might be more insecure then she lets on; the loner band-geek searching for the perfect girl; and the star of the basketball team, working to gain a full ride scholarship.

As the story progresses, we learn that the "problems" these kids have aren't really problems at all: they're just going through the same irrelevant, silly motions all kids go through. The narcissistic self-loathing, the grandiose tales of he said/she said -- all of it is petty and trivial in real life, and even more so onscreen. Each subject is hyper-aware of the fact that they're being filmed, and the "drama" is milked for all that it's worth. The situations instantly become intensified in an unrealistic sense (would she have really cried that hard if the cameras weren't there?)

If this is the "American Teen" of the 21st century, then teenagers have it pretty fucking easy, which leads me to believe that this film was simply cashing in on the Laguna Beach trend of over privileged white kids and their problems. Show me the real American Teen: the kid who lives on the Southside of Chicago who's afraid to go to school because kids are getting shot and killed on their way to class every morning; the closeted homosexual, petrified of coming out to his WASP, Red State-living parents; the kid who's picked on mercifully day in and day out, who is prone to violent outbursts and isn't afraid to "do something about it."

To me, that's the real American Teen. Those are real issues. The guy who dumped you won't mean shit in three years: the kid you used to call a "fag" every day in gym class who shows up with a semi-automatic one day will.

Sugarcoated and fake.

2/5