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Reviews of Recent Independent, Foreign, & Documentary Films in Theaters and DVD/Home Video
BART GOT A ROOM It’s hard to imagine a teen sex comedy in 2009 about prom without sex. For what audience would such a novelty be produced? Even Ione Skye and John Cusack screwed after graduation in 1988’s lighthearted romance Say Anything. Returning to that decade’s breezy teen model for Bart Got a Room, writer/director Brian Hecker’s screwball comedy about high-school life will resonate stronger with former rather than current teens. A smart student coasting through his senior year, Danny Stein (Steven Kaplan) finds himself without a prom date. He could fall back on his best friend Camille (Arrested Development’s Alia Shawkat), but that’s just the problem. His friends convince him that prom is a night where dreams are fulfilled in a hotel bed, not some sentimental culmination of platonic memories. And Camille is great, but she’s not an impossible dream. Danny starts to scan his middle-class Jewish Floridian outpost for eligible dates of all shapes, sizes, and sexual experiences—all the while turning down Camille, whose parents berate him with Yiddish undertones for being such a bad friend. (The opening’s credit fonts and swinging jazz score draw a blunt Woody Allen comparison, but this isn’t Allen humor, it’s just a Jewish milieu.) It’s the unhappiness of his divorced parents that compounds Danny’s inevitable realization that there’s more to life than getting laid. His parents are played with both kitsch and heartfelt realism by William H. Macy and Cheryl Hines, who are perfect acting models for Kaplan, who picks up their style to play Danny. Each actor exudes optimism and disappointment, but mugs for the punch line at a moment’s notice. Be
forewarned: while there is a lack of sex here, Jennifer Tilly does make
a quick appearance, engaging in cybersex with Danny’s father.
That’s for the best, because only an online avatar could mask the
delightfully unattractive Jewfro wig Macy dons for this film.
Zachary Jones
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