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GHOST WORLD
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Sincerity is the key, said Groucho Marx; if you can fake that, you’ve got it made. Watching today's independent movies, Groucho might have said, Sullenness is the key. To be a fashion model of either gender, you must deliver the expressionless scowl that says, do me, I have attitude.
With GHOST WORLD, former child grumps Scarlett Johansson (who as Grace pouted her way through THE HORSE WHISPERER) as Rebecca and Thora Birch (who sulked effectively in AMERICAN BEAUTY) as Enid unite for a twin teen angst-fest.
Billed as a comedy, it is anything but (despite some very funny throwaway movie jokes). Clutching their sheepskin, Rebecca and Enid stomp their mortarboards, give the finger to their Los Angeles high school, and spend their days inventing lurid extravagant back stories as a means of mocking people they see. The adults who bound Rebecca and Enid’s lives are played (with ego sacrifice so saintly it borders on martyrdom) by grownup Indy demigods: Bob Balaban as Enid’s feckless father, Illeana Douglas as Roberta, an aging flower child summer-school art teacher, and an uncredited Teri Garr as Maxine, Enid’s father’s hideous fiancée, the grotesque caricature of the over-lacquered decrepit adult.
Eventually Enid fastens on cardigan-wearing, milkshake-slurping loser Seymour (Steve Buscemi) at 50’s diner Wowsville. She finds herself drawn to him because while he is outwardly pathetic he is perfectly self-aware — Buddha with a record-collecting fetish — and kind. Without ever meaning to he draws in Enid, who is young, smart, zaftig, spectacularly dressed (a breathtaking collection of killer retro togs not seen since SWINGERS) … and miserable. The story, when it finally develops, swings on the relationship between disaffected surly Enid and washed-up, clear-eyed Seymour.
In several senses, this movie is tough. The first forty minutes are an exercise in wall-climbing, silent-scream boredom not seen since WINGS OF DESIRE (if ever there was a movie for which to arrive late, this is it), but somehow, when Enid’s facade cracks and Seymour shows his dork dignity, a genuinely moving plot line develops.
In the end, your tolerance of this movie hinges on Enid, who blows hot and cold on everyone around her. If you find her masochistically credible, the movie’s second half will absorb if disturb you. If you think her a spoiled brat oblivious to the damage her pranks wreak, you will want to walk out.
P S The film has a great web site: http://www.ghostworld-themovie.com/