"Rocket Science" lifts off with brilliance. Defying gravity, its perfectly-cast high school characters ascend above their dysfunctional parents, above their prior perceived limitations. They chart the lift that debating--the single most educational endeavor in which a student can participate-- can give to those who learn to wage warfare with rapid-fire words.
The film opens with promise--the promise us that our protagonist, the stuttering Hal Hefner, played by Reece Thompson, along with his even better partner, the perfectly cast Anna Kendrick, will rise above his prior limitations.
But halfway through, the movie loses its direction and wanders aimlessly. Hal loses his partner, then his chances at debating. The audience expects him to regain the girl, to overcome these obstacles, and to reach the State finals. But in the end, the film falters and just ends. It ends with his beaten, defeated father telling him that most people give up trying to make sense of it all, and that he should do the same.
What a shame. What a shame that the writer/director, having brought his characters to such heights, lets them down, and with them, the audience.
Somehow, more seasoned writers and directors manage a happy ending. Stuttering can be overcome (e.g., in "Shakespeare in Love"); disabilities can be overcome (e.g., "Murderball"); wrongful accusations can be overcome (e.g., "Frenzy"); childhood limitations can be overcome (e.g., "The Miracle Worker"). Even the dark and violent "Eastern Promises" somehow manages, in the experienced hands of a Cronenberg, to show how a bad beginning can have a happy ending.
Not so in the hands of inexperienced, newbie writers/directors. They (perhaps having seen too many screenings of "Bicycle Thief") think happy endings are trite or forced, and let things end badly, thinking themselves sophisticates. Their scripts, like "Rocket Science," lack a last reel.
If the promising "Rocket Science" had followed its initial trajectory, it could have soared above now-famous movies, like "Searching for Bobby Fischer" or "Hoosiers." But when a movie betrays an audience, the audience has a way of voting with its feet and its dollars; it can choose not to view such a disappointing movie. This movie has thus been hastily ushered out of the theaters and relegated to obscurity. And its writer/director, Jeffrey Blitz, having disappointed his audience so badly, has probably gone on to write his next epic: "How Helen Keller Gave Up And Failed To Overcome Her Disabilities."
The film opens with promise--the promise us that our protagonist, the stuttering Hal Hefner, played by Reece Thompson, along with his even better partner, the perfectly cast Anna Kendrick, will rise above his prior limitations.
But halfway through, the movie loses its direction and wanders aimlessly. Hal loses his partner, then his chances at debating. The audience expects him to regain the girl, to overcome these obstacles, and to reach the State finals. But in the end, the film falters and just ends. It ends with his beaten, defeated father telling him that most people give up trying to make sense of it all, and that he should do the same.
What a shame. What a shame that the writer/director, having brought his characters to such heights, lets them down, and with them, the audience.
Somehow, more seasoned writers and directors manage a happy ending. Stuttering can be overcome (e.g., in "Shakespeare in Love"); disabilities can be overcome (e.g., "Murderball"); wrongful accusations can be overcome (e.g., "Frenzy"); childhood limitations can be overcome (e.g., "The Miracle Worker"). Even the dark and violent "Eastern Promises" somehow manages, in the experienced hands of a Cronenberg, to show how a bad beginning can have a happy ending.
Not so in the hands of inexperienced, newbie writers/directors. They (perhaps having seen too many screenings of "Bicycle Thief") think happy endings are trite or forced, and let things end badly, thinking themselves sophisticates. Their scripts, like "Rocket Science," lack a last reel.
If the promising "Rocket Science" had followed its initial trajectory, it could have soared above now-famous movies, like "Searching for Bobby Fischer" or "Hoosiers." But when a movie betrays an audience, the audience has a way of voting with its feet and its dollars; it can choose not to view such a disappointing movie. This movie has thus been hastily ushered out of the theaters and relegated to obscurity. And its writer/director, Jeffrey Blitz, having disappointed his audience so badly, has probably gone on to write his next epic: "How Helen Keller Gave Up And Failed To Overcome Her Disabilities."