srt@ucla-cs.UUCP (06/11/85)
My Science Project is a summer film from Disney that I saw in a preview
last night. It is an adventure film of sorts; a high school guy finds a
mysterious alien artifact that does strange things. Adventure results.
I found the movie fun and not overly involving, I give it a fair
recommendation.
What prompts me to post this is the use of cheap stereotypes and moralizing
throughout this film, a trend that is, I think, growing in movies aimed
at the younger (i.e., high school aged) crowd.
In this movie, we have the obligatory: nerd, female nerd who wants to
become popular, bimbo, dumb auto shop guy, and Brooklyn tough guy.
We also have the obligatory scenes: dumb auto shop guy looks stupid in
science class. Nerd follows around nerd girl, laughing stupidly through
nose (don't even audition for a nerd part if you can't laugh through your
nose). Dumb auto shop guy gets dumped by bimbo. Brooklyn tough guy has
typical Brooklyn tough guy lowrider car, typical Brooklyn tough guy open
shirt, typical Brooklyn tough guy slicked back hair, etc.
And, of course, the killer, killer scene: dumb auto shop guy and female
nerd who wants to become popular fall in love and realize that the other
is a (drumroll) REAL person.
What bothers me about this is not the moral they are pushing, nor the
societal pressures that led to this kind of thing being mandatory in
youth films (remember the ridiculous scene at the end of Karate Kid where
the "bad" guy all of the sudden repents?) but the fact that the morals
film makers are pushing are so transparent and simplistic. I think that
high school aged kids are, for the most part, more intelligent than film
makers credit them, and would respond well to films that included a more
serious level of moralizing. We all face difficult moral situations in
day to day life that don't magically resolve themselves when we realize
``Hey, nerds are people too!''. Can't this be reflected in the movies?
Scott R. Turner
ARPA: (now) srt@UCLA-LOCUS.ARPA (soon) srt@LOCUS.UCLA.EDU
UUCP: ...!{cepu,ihnp4,trwspp,ucbvax}!ucla-cs!srt
SPUDNET: ...eye%srt@russet.spudleeper@mtgzz.UUCP (m.r.leeper) (08/15/85)
MY SCIENCE PROJECT
A film review by Mark R. Leeper
Capsule review: MY SCIENCE PROJECT gets a barely passing grade.
Back around 1960 Disney Studios made a couple of decent fantasy films:
THE SHAGGY DOG and THE ABSENT-MINDED PROFESSOR. After that they hit a
slump, making a series of films that traded off of the popularity of these
films. They were mostly similar in content to these films; some were
sequels. There was some market for these bland films, but Disney's lack of
originality was sowing the seeds of audience contempt for the Disney name.
MY SCIENCE PROJECT is the film that Disney should have made in 1962.
Unfortunately, they did not, and now it is too late. Audiences have higher
expectations from post-STAR WARS fantasy films and MY SCIENCE PROJECT really
does not hack it.
The story is of a high school car lover who is forced to do a science
project. He wants to rebuild the engine of a World War II airplane which he
was going to "borrow" from a local air base. Instead, he gets the engine
from a UFO that the government has been hiding for years. It does weird
things and in the finale--which seems hours into the film--it opens a hole
in the space-time continuum and lets through a Whitman's Sampler of
dangerous humans and animals from other points of space-time.
Back when audiences expected a lot of only vaguely amusing story and
were willing to wait for a fantasy punch at the end, this sort of story
would have cut the mustard. The film has other problems too. The
characters all seem to know why they are doing what they are doing, but
often it is not explained very well to the audience. At one point, the
characters seem to be chasing some electrical something on power wires.
First, it is the slowest thing that ever went over power lines, but even
beyond that, the script never explains what it is they are chasing or what
would happen if they lost the race. Often scenes seem to fail because the
director has no idea how long a scene should take. At one point two
characters have a two-minute conversation while holding up a line of cars.
I can see the line waiting while the grease-monkey repairs the lead car, but
the conversation went on long after he finished.
This film has problems with continuity, logic, and especially pacing.
Rate it a low 0 on the -4 to +4 scale.
Mark R. Leeper
...ihnp4!mtgzz!leeper