Rushmore **1/2 (out of 5) (1998)

Cast: Jason Schwartzman, Bill Murray, Olivia Williams, Seymour Cassel, Brian Cox

Directed by Wes Anderson

 

A 15-year-old student at a preppy private school is a gifted young man but gets lousy grades, as he has decided to become involved in every club and activity you can imagine. A rich factory owner takes a liking to the boy and they become friends, but the relationship becomes strained when they both fall in love with one of the teachers at Rushmore. Soon the boy gets a probationary expulsion from Rushmore due to a crazy plan to build an aquarium on campus and is sent to a rough public school, where it isn't as easy to maintain all his extracurricular activities. He also plots revenge on his factory owner "friend" who seemingly steals the object of his affection from right under his nose.

This is an extremely quirky little comedy/drama, which has a few funny moments (mostly supplied by the excellent Murray), but maintains a superficial storyline and meanders in zany antics without any direction. You'll either love this film or be perplexed for the duration , as some critics have hailed it as the best film of 1998. I found the film to be a near-miss due to becoming lost amid it's own attempts to be clever. The film tries to be funny but seldomly achieves any laughs, it tries to be a drama but rarely has a genuinely compelling moment, and it tries to be a romance but the characters are painted so one-dimensionally that you wonder how anyone could like them, much less love them. It's certertainly refreshing to know that there are filmmakers like Wes Anderson who tries his best to make an original film but it seems like he tried a little to hard to do too much and lost focus of his vision during the production. Fans of offbeat films should find lots to like here, but others will find it uneven and ultimately forgettable.

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