THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, September 2, 1995 TAG: 9509010066
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E2 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Movie Review
SOURCE: BY MAL VINCENT, ENTERTAINMENT WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 107 lines
INDIFFERENCE IS at the very heart of ``Kids,'' the latest film to suggest that the current generation is going to hell with only this brief stop in purgatory. This film is deceptively casual about wasted lives - so casual that we are made to fill in our own emotions.
The older generation has been predicting doom for the youngsters since time began. This time the case is made more convincing by using a straightforward narrative and limited time frame - 24 hours in the lives of a group of New York teenagers who are interested in nothing but sex and skateboarding, not necessarily in that order. What evolves is an all-encompassing tragedy.
You will not leave this film unaffected. By using kid actors who actually look like kids and by pronouncing no judgment whatsoever, photographer-turned-filmmaker Larry Clark creates an all-too-believable world of aimlessness. ``Waste'' might be a more appropriate title.
The character you will most remember is a skinny, acne-traced 17-year-old boy named Telly, played (or rather represented) by Leo Fitzpatrick. He lives for sex, but just not any sex. His specialty is de-flowering virgins, two a day. The age of his girlfriends ranges from 12 to 14. As the film begins, he announces a new conquest. As it ends, his hapless friend, Casper, who isn't so ``lucky'' in his sexual pursuits, casually rapes a drugged-out, almost comatose, girl.
In between, it is learned that Telly is HIV positive as a former ``conquest'' searches for him to reveal this.
Along the way, the neighborhood crowd guzzles 40-ounce bottles of malt liquor, smokes dope and wanders. In one scene, Telly steals money from his mother's purse, but for the most part, this is a world without adults. Unlike the teen-movie genre of the past, there is no real effort here to picture the adults as being non-understanding louts. They simply don't exist. This is a peer society.
Markedly, too, this film departs from the usual in that it doesn't make teen rebellion just a male thing. In a girl-talk scene, the females are shown to be just as casual, and just as crazed, about sex and other momentary pleasures as the males. While there is talk about contraceptives, you get the idea that these people aren't worried. Like all youngsters, they consider themselves invincible. They don't read obituaries. In fact, it is doubtful they can read.
``Kids'' is by no means a great movie, but it just might have some kind of sustained effect on American society. After creating quite a stir in Los Angeles and its New York setting, there is a big question as to how it will be accepted around the country. One feels, and one hopes, that it is not as pertinent to society in general as it is to those urban centers, but this is a movie that allows no kidding. As you sit through it, you know that in some cases, it is truth.
The film itself comes with a history.
Larry Clark is the self-proclaimed ``outlaw'' photographer who presented the less-seemly aspects of teen life in photo books like the ultra-personal ``Tulsa'' (published in 1971) and ``Teenage Lust'' (1993). Now 50, he obsessed, according to his press statements, about making a teen movie that (1) used kids that were the right age, (2) didn't right all the wrongs by the final reel and (3) was grounded in reality.
He has succeeded on all three counts, but you could hardly call what he has done centered in directorial vision. By staying away, and keeping his distance, he uses our own paranoia to allow the audience itself to fill in the gaps. But is this reality or just Clark's own sleazoid fantasies?
Even though some viewers have mistaken the film for a documentary, the performers are actors, and are, in spite of their looks, old enough to avoid the kiddie porn laws.
Clark hung out in the Washington Square area of New York and got the skateboard kids to talk about their lives. He recruited many of his novice actors from the area.
The script was written by a 19-year-old high school drop out named Harmony Korine, who is the grandson of Huntz Hall, the actor who was the comedy relief part of the movies' Bowery Boys.
When the film received the heinous NC-17 rating from the Motion Picture Association of America, Miramax, the wing of the Disney company that had purchased ``Kids,'' refused to release it. After several appeals, and controversy that sold tickets, a new company, Excalibur, was created to release it. Although it is being released with no rating, the company's ads suggest that no one under 18 will be allowed to see it without a parent or legal guardian. The Naro Expanded Cinema has said it will enforce the policy.
``Kids'' arrives amid critical uncertainty. The New York Times calls it ``a wake-up call to the world,'' but the Los Angeles Times says it is ``tedious rather than titillating, one of those cinematic irritations more interesting to read about than to see.''
One thing is certain. ``Kids'' is, indeed, an irritation. It is a downer. One would like to think its scenario only applies to New York City. But even the most committed optimist would have trouble buying that.
``Kids'' is so offhanded, so casual, and so ultimately tragic that it sends us away, if not in a state of shock, at least in a state of concern. MEMO: MOVIE REVIEW ``Kids''
Cast: Leo Fitzpatrick, Sarah Henderson, Justin Pierce
Director: Larry Clark
Screenplay: Harmony Korine
Music: Louis Barlow
MPAA rating: NC-17, although released with no official rating
(language, sex, drugs)
Mal's rating: 2 1/2 stars
Location: Naro in Norfolk ILLUSTRATION: EXCALIBUR photo
Yakira Peguero and Leo Fitzpatrick star in ``Kids,'' a narrative
about teens interested in no more than sex and skateboarding.
by CNB