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Directed by Alexander Payne
Starring Matthew Broderick, Reese Witherspoon, Chris Klein, Jessica Campbell
USA, 1999
Rated R (sexual content, language, a scene of drug use)
RESSE REIGNS IN A FLIMSY FILM
Earlier this year, October Sky graced the screen with a fluff of an answer to the
regular high school movie. Election is another teenage flick but it, too, steps away
from the formulaic, audience-friendly methods observed in She’s All That. Election
is the complete opposite of October Sky, though; while the latter was light, uplifting,
and easy-going fare, Election is a scathing satire. Sadly, though Alexander Payne’s
new concoction is at times a refreshing break from the assembly-line gunk that
Hollywood has so often targeted at teenagers lately, Election is sort of a train wreck
of a movie. It has great ideas to share, but it gets a bit lost and, by the end, I don’t
think it has too much to say.
However, the movie has lots of things going for it: a masterpiece of a performance by Reese Witherspoon, an intelligent and savvy director, tar black and on-target humor, and a healthy amount of ridicule for both sides of the story. It isn’t a lop-sided film, and that’s a great quality to have in a world of cinema that all-too frequently separates its characters into the stereotypical groups of "Good" and "Evil." Election, based on the Tom Perrotta novel, tells a story about a high school election and the seemingly ugly people involved. Tracy Flick (Witherspoon), a go-getter who will stop at nothing to succeed, is the film’s antagonist at first. She is determined and claims to be at the lower level of the social ladder. She seems like a heartless over-achiever to her teacher, Mr. McAllister (Matthew Broderick), and he is constantly annoyed by her (and begins to loathe her after she has an affair with a good friend and colleague of his, Dave, who eventually gets fired).
This year, Tracy is the only student running for school president. Mr. McAllister persuades Paul Metzler, a dumb but popular and friendly student, to run for president also. One of the funniest aspects about Reese Witherspoon’s performance is her vocal inflections and in one of the film’s funniest scenes, she rants on with an overwhelming anger in her voice after she hears Paul has started campaigning. She continues to mention Paul as a filthy rich kid who gets everything handed to him "on a silver spoon." "No, it didn’t bother me at all!" she yelps about her new opposition almost tearfully on the soundtrack.
Tammy (Jessica Campbell), Paul’s sister, decides to run for president when her girlfriend begins to detest her lesbianism and starts to have a relationship with Paul. When the three contenders give their presidential speeches at an assembly, Tracy refers to a Thoreau quote and Paul reads directly from a written speech. Tammy, when she is received with boos and mockery from her peers, delivers a cynical, albeit honest, speech protesting against the student government, saying the only people effected by this "charade" of campaigning are the contenders.
Tammy is Election’s rebellious, teenage moral center. While Tracy is violently ambitious and Paul is completely oblivious and Mr. McAllister claims to know ‘morals’ and ‘ethics,’ Tammy remains blunt, a character searching not for fame, goodness, or success, but for life. She is Election’s version of the true-to-life adolescent and Jessica Campbell gives an effective performance.
Reese Witherspoon has a lot of talent. In Pleasantville, she was a Tammy. Here, she is a truly irritating girl who wakes up at the wee hours of morning to bake 400 cupcakes for her campaign. Tracy Flick is not completely stone, though. She may be a wicked, scheming clay model for most of the film but, in a surprising scene, she becomes a breathing woman with vulnerabilities. Election would be pretentious if it gave her a complete change of heart at the end, but there is a streak of softness to the character when she wonders if what she is pursuing is of all that much importance.
Matthew Broderick is impressive as Mr. McAllister. We begin to think he is the hero of the film, but he is flawed as ever. He is a confused man. What Election boils down to is, perhaps, a comparison between school elections and American political elections. It is film about groups: the brutal go-getters (Tracy Flick), the muddled idealists (Mr. McAllister), the clueless knuckle-heads (Paul Metzler), and the angry rebels (Tammy). Alexander Payne bashes his characters from all angles, then allows us to love them a bit. We know these characters: I see them everyday in 8th grade (I confess to being a mixture of the first two categories).
It is very hard to keep a film fair to all sides and Election loses steam by being a little too desperate. It’s as if we can see the wheels turning in Payne’s head, which is what movies shouldn’t be about. Movies should make the magic seem effortless, but Election wants to crawl through mud to be drop dead entertaining (which it sometimes is) and have its own set of lessons at the end of its rainbow. Sometimes it works out, but many times, the film has its face in the mud. Its cynical comedy is often too forced for my tastes. Still, I’ll say this in its defense:
It’s the best MTV movie I’ve ever seen.
By Andrew Chan
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