One of the definitions of pornography is the depiction of acts in a sensational manner so as to arouse a quick intense emotional reaction <the pornography of violence. The director Larry Clark makes it too easy to lash out at the film's countless scenes of graphic sex and nudity, which from a plot standpoint are all truly superfluous. Everybody has a voyeuristic side to himself or herself and this movie is one big peepshow I'll tell you that. If getting the audience's rapt attention was Clark's main goal, he did succeed but he needn't have done so by such ignoble means. This true story has innate prurient interest already and its message is an important one. Clark had only to examine the true mindsets of these kids in order to bring home his pointed obsession with disillusioned youth. Unfortunately, just as in Kids, he chooses to show rather than tell and the end of this tragedy leaves us with a battlefield of inhumanity whose logical manifestations are irresponsibly absent as if to say our children are not human. There's nothing more amoral and disgusting as murdering someone and I imagine it must take a truly volatile, hopping mad, disturbed person or persons to go through with it and the activities that the youths in this film indulge in are totally inconsistent with their actions in the end. Borrowing from the old hippie saying, `Make love not war', it would seem that these kids' motivation after screwing and smoking and drinking and tripping their brains out would be merely to crash on a chaise-lounge and soak up some rays. If these characters were on that much acid and grass they probably couldn't manage a trip to the bathroom never mind beating and bludgeoning and bashing somebody to death.
A good film is usually the result of insightful and well-developed storytelling. In Bully the plot is merely an excuse, a backdrop to showcase Clark's heavy boner for decadence. In somebody else's hands, even in TV's movie of the week hands, you would have gotten a better story.
A good film is usually the result of insightful and well-developed storytelling. In Bully the plot is merely an excuse, a backdrop to showcase Clark's heavy boner for decadence. In somebody else's hands, even in TV's movie of the week hands, you would have gotten a better story.