PRETTY PERSUASION
Directed by: Marcos Siega.
Produced by: Todd Dagres, Carl Levin, Marcos Siega & Matthew Weaver.
Written by: Skander Halim.
Director of Photography: Ramsey Nickell.
Edited by: Nicholas Erasmus.
Music by: Gilad Benamram.
Released by: Samuel Goldwyn/Roadside Attractions.
Country of Origin: USA. 104 min. Not Rated.
With: Evan Rachel Wood, Ron Livingston, James Woods, Jane Krakowski, Elisabeth Harnois, Selma Blair & Adi Schnall.

Following the likes of Alicia Silverstone in Clueless and Sarah Michelle Gellar in Cruel Intentions, Evan Rachel Wood holds her own as a teenage queen bee, her porcelain skin and hypnotic blue eyes accentuating the pubescent charm and demonic intelligence oozing out from within. But unfortunately, she is the only element of originality in this social commentary-cum-teen comedy turned tragedy.

The film begins with Kimberly Joyce (Wood) introducing recently arrived Middle Eastern immigrant Randa (Adi Schnall) to her ritzy Beverly Hills high school. Fired from playing Anne Frank in the school play, Kimberly recruits Randa, as well as her best friend Brittany (Elisabeth Harnois), to falsely accuse their English and drama teacher, Mr. Anderson (Ron Livingston), of sexual assault. The film quickly moves on to a court scene, and from there it backtracks to the events leading up to the case, where Kimberly's demented yearnings for fame and most of all revenge are revealed.

Through Kimberly, America in Pretty Persuasion is depicted as a society where sex is the ultimate currency. The ambitious reporter Emily Klein (Jane Krakowski) easily falls for Kimberly’s charms, Mr. Anderson has a penchant in seeing his wife (Selma Blair) in a school girl uniform, and finally, Kimberly's father (an over-the-top performance by the usually impeccable James Woods) is a pill-popping workaholic who has more love for phone sex than for his own daughter. While Pretty Persuasion is more politically incorrect than, say, Heathers, it does not retain the satirical view with which the former film melded comedy with tragedy. Pretty Persuasion is too kinky to be serious and too self-aware of its critical purpose - in one of the film's darker scenes, Randa writes "We are all sinners" in Arabic on a chalkboard.

Though Wood makes Kimberly enviably shrewd and cunning, she is made to shed a remorseful tear in the final scene. Even her acting cannot save Kimberly from becoming the stuff of teenage cliché. Ultimately, the most disturbing message of Pretty Persuasion is that nowadays the apathetic teenager recoiling into senseless violence has become so prevalent that it hardly makes for an intriguing film. Marie Iida
August 12, 2005