I Just Saw…

Kicking and Screaming. (R, 1995, Olivia D’ Abo, Josh Hamilton) No, this isn’t the Will Ferrell soccer comedy with the same name, produced ten years later. Instead, this is the first writing and directing effort from Noah Baumbach (The Squid and the Whale).

The Generation X version of St. Elmo’s Fire (sans an awesome Man in Motion type theme song), this movie starts with a group of friends after college graduation, then follows them for roughly a year as they try to deal with the ‘real world.’ While I really enjoyed this film, it’s amazing to me to see how only a few years can make a huge generational difference. This was geared toward the gen xers, realizing the time to ditch the flannel, shave and wash the hair was near. Their strife and anxiety is captured perfectly, I’m told, with accurate and poignant humor.

I liked the movie for different reasons. As is always the case with Baumbach’s films, it’s dialogue driven and doesn’t make you work hard to identify the story lines and/or the plot. Instead, you can sit back and enjoy the conversations as if you were an observer, laughing to yourself when appropriate as well as looking away during an ‘I can’t believe they just said that’ moment.

My main complaint, as with The Squid and the Whale (which is a better film with better acting) is the endings. Not a stranger to ambiguous endings, I do find Baumbach’s a tad annoying in the fact that they end so abruptly that they leave no loose ends for you to even draw your own conclusions. At least that was the case with the Squid and the Whale. As far as I know that was the case with Kicking and Screaming too. Who knows? I might feel differently if I was a bit older. Fortunately, I missed Gen X.

See it if you liked: Reality Bites, The Squid and the Whale, St. Elmo’s Fire