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Art School Confidential

Re-teaming with his Ghost World cohort, Daniel Clowes, director Terry Zwigoff takes another of Clowes’ ideas and runs. Again, utilizing the same kind of patterned recognition of those incapable of being cool, simply because they cannot stop being themselves, Zwigoff and Co. not only show that they understand that kind of displacement, they are experts in the field.

Art School Confidential is the kind of movie that will have everyone watching, relating. The jokes come fast and furious, and typically in the form of lovelorn suffering of the main character, who also happens to be the prototypical “every man.” Max Minghella’s performance as Jerome Platz, has to not only carry the film, but ground the audience in it when the derailing and inconvenient plot kicks into high gear. Surrounded by art school numbskulls isn’t enough for this comedy; nor is a simple plot. The filmmakers here have a smart, satirical comedy about the nebulous area people, attempting to combine creativity and success, often find themselves. Throw in a couple of well acted numbskulls and a beautiful object of desire and you have a pretty good movie. So what plot device do they decide will bring the whole mix to a state of perfection, but a serial killer? This is the same kind of poorly chosen plot device that prevented Office Space from becoming a truly classic film. Instead of the hum-drum existence of office politics most of us know so well, Mike Judge filled his film with a ridiculous and outlandish plot-line of corporate espionage that was neither fulfilling nor believable. The exact same can be said for Art School Confidential’s serial killer subplot.

That aside, Zwigoff does still have his comedic chops in the right place. The jokes, for the first 30 minutes, come fast and furious and will have you believing in the film long after it was time for it to be put to sleep. Co-stars, John Malkovich, Ethan Suplee and the wonderful Jim Broadbent all brighten up a fairly dark comedy.

Sony Pictures does a nice job with the supplemental material on this film, although, it could be significantly less sparse. "The Making of Art School Confidential" featurette reeks of how typical all featurettes can be, but there is still the Sundance featurette, deleted scenes and a blooper reel that round out a decent, if lacking disc on a movie that can be described the same.

Written by: Kevin Yeoman

Reviewers Rating: 5.5
Reader's Rating: 8.00
Reader's Votes: 1

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