Heathers

"Now I use my massive IQ to choose which colour lip gloss to wear'

Heathers is the ultimate anti teenage-movie. If teenage movies show kids working together (like The Faculty) or at least getting along well with each other (like Scream), Heathers shows teenagers as they often tend to be - bitchy and segregated into opposing sub-cultures, where the strong pick on the weak and those without support fall the hardest. In this mess the most powerful clique in school are the Heathers - three girls called Heather and one Veronica Sawyer; a sensative soul with 'a massive IQ' who is growing sick of the misery and suffering her 'friends' like to indulge in. Enter Jason 'JD' Dean, a new student who shows Veronica that maybe her school would be a better place if a few of its less pleasant individuals were dead. Starting with the chief Heather...

Unsurprisingly this film is a big favourite amongst those who suffered at high-school. Anyone who was ever in the least bit ostracized, despised, laughed at or even ignored by their peers (that includes me) will fully appreciate such moments as the obnoxious jocks' murder being disguised as a double suicide over a homosexual affair, or JD's statement that 'the only place people of different social groups can truly get along is Heaven!'.

JD and Veronica think they have found the perfect solution. Oh joy, a teenager with a gun.

JD realises that 'his way' ultimately ends only in self-destruction

Despite how this may sound, however, Heathers is far more than an amoral exercise in blackly comic malice. It is an allegory, not just of high-school, but of life as a whole. It makes it clear that yes, life is unfair; that human beings dislike and despise each other more often than not, and that power is often wielded by those vicious and nasty enough to claim it for themselves. But it also shows us the way to make things better; not through the nihililistically amoral carnage planned by JD (the epitome of the pointlessly dissatisfied, emotionally undernourished poor little rich kid) but by catching those who fall and taking the responsibility of defending the rest from those that seek to destroy them. And it also shows that if you are intelligent enough to see the misery, then you should do something about it. Which is why at the end Veronica not only goes up against JD, she also claims the red hairband of power from the green Heather and blows off her Prom to spend an evening watching videos and eating popcorn with the unpopular and overweight Martha Dunstock. And don't I wish someone had done that for me.

(Please note, all pictures displayed here are not mine are used without permission of their owners because I'm recommending that you go out and rent/see/buy a copy of this film, thus increasing their profits. However, should they disapprove, please can they mail me and I'll remove them.)