Heathers (1989) 102m.
You'd think that a comedy about a topic as touchy as teenage suicide would be box-office poison, but check this one out anyway. HEATHERS is a cool, sharp, satire about a group of high school seniors who make the discovery that you can be more popular dead than alive. Winona Ryder is Veronica,a satellite member of an exclusive tripartite sorority in an Ohio high school. Enter Christian Slater (in Jack Nicholson mode) as JD - Jason Dean, a rebel without a conscience - who sees more potential in Ryder than just another member of a school clique. The confusing relationship between Veronica and JD is what sets events in motion: although Ryder is appalled at what he does, she can't fully extricate herself from his schemes. And what are those schemes exactly? Even JD doesn't seem to know ("Chaos is great!" he exhorts) and his phony family life offers only the most rudimentary of clues. But the universe of HEATHERS is too out of kilter for us to have any concerns about Slater's character - it's easier to simply accept him as an agent of change who has breezed into town. JD knows he is fatally flawed (which probably explains his affinity with Captain Ahab), involved as he is with an anarchic quest which no-one apart from Veronica seems capable of understanding. It comes as no surprise that his preoccupation with murder and suicide (which are both the same thing to him) escalates into a self-destructive climax.
Potentially offensive subject matter is defused right from film's opening - if you're willing to believe that three girls all coincidentally named Heather are running their campus then you'll go along with the notion of death as just another cruel high school prank. The cast play every scene straight, regardless of its absurd or unnerving context - but it's also this neutrality (i.e. neither truly scary or laugh-out-loud funny) that leaves me wanting somehow. On the plus side it does have several quotable lines and a supporting role by Shannen Doherty (who would reprise her Bad Girl on Campus role in TV's BEVERLY HILLS 90210) as the second 'Heather' in the pecking order. Film's big fan following is a little disquieting when you realize that two girls were poisoned by their fourteen year old 'best friend' who was copying the murders she'd seen on screen. It makes me wonder how prominently the revenge element of the film features as an attraction for its fans.
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