Filmmaker Gary Winick died on Sunday at the age of 49. While in recent years he was known for his work on larger movies like 13 Going On 30 and Bride Wars, we’ve always been partial to his breakthrough film: an indie comedy from 2002 called Tadpole. The premise is simple: Oscar Grubman, a 15-year old preppie with an ancient soul (think Max Fischer), has a crush on his oblivious stepmother, Eve. But because the film is set in the affluent social circles of the Upper West Side, our protagonist likes to randomly speak in French and quote Voltaire; when characters fight, the heated exchange takes place over a game of tennis; and a romance between an adult woman and a young boy seems plausible rather than illegal. It’s a very adult world for a teenager to inhabit, and one that has only been captured a handful of times on film. Click though as we revisit some of our favorite examples.
No matter how we turned out or how unique we think we are, the truth is that most of us fit some high school stereotype or another. And we like to think that, even if we’ve given up our Star Wars action figure collection or stopped playing football, we keep a little piece of that history with us in our adult lives. So, as kids everywhere are preparing to head back to school, and in honor of those inner nerds and jocks, we present a selection of high-school films tailored to your high-school stereotype.
On Attractive Qualities in Men: Metropolitan, Nick: “Rick Von Slonecker is tall, rich, good looking, stupid, dishonest, conceited, a bully, liar, drunk and thief, an egomaniac, and probably psychotic. In short, highly attractive to women.”
NYC Prep, Taylor: “I’m, like, attracted to Sebastian. I like his hair.”
- The Faster Times compares dialogue from “WASP Woody Allen” Whit Stillman’s classic Metropolitan with the verbiage of the possibly morally and definitely grammatically bankrupt teens of Bravo’s NYC Prep. BTW, who watched last night? We hope the producers feel at least a little ashamed after they achieved their goal of convincingly insinuating that a 17-year-old girl did something slutty. Team Camille!
