Review of Bully (2011) by Edith N — 23 Jun 2012

Surprisingly cares more about the characters than just trying to shock the audience and make them feel terrible. I don't know why that surprised me so much; perhaps because he loves Harmony Korine so much.

The beginning starts out kinda rough. I felt like Marty having sex with Lisa, then she wakes up naked and goes out to tell her mom she has a new boyfriend was strange. I understand how it worked for the characters.

It's a decent setup, but in the film it just seemed silly to have her lying in bed naked, then go out and talk to her mom without anything said other than she has a new boyfriend. Sometimes I was wondering why they were nude so much, but those are the only two things that felt pretty off to me.

I understand that these kids are horny and work off their primal instincts more than anything, but the nudity and sex did become excessive after a while, like Clark either lost track of how much his characters had clothes on or like he was just trying to push the audience's buttons.

I think that was really the only controversial to be controversial bit. Even the rape scenes are cut short. I appreciated that. I understood how bad Bobby was without showing a full length rape scene.

What I really loved about the film was how Clark gave the audience plenty to work off of, but never threw it in their face. Bobby seems like he could be gay for Marty. Perhaps that's why he's so angry all the time? He keeps it bottled up and instead of accepting his homosexuality he takes it out on everyone else.

He makes a gay porno and when he's having sex with Ali he turns on a different gay porno. Everyone thinks it's gross except him. I also thought perhaps something happened between he and his father.

One time Brad's dad walks in on him naked and they continue to just have a chat. Either this hints at what could have happened between them in the past, or this shows his father's inability to see what's wrong with him.

The latter makes the most sense, but I'm sure someone could make a compelling argument for the first as well. I think more than anything, Clark's showing how these parents were absent in these kids's lives.

Lisa's mom doesn't seem to care to much about her. Bobby's parents turn a blind eye to his bullying and praise him for his achievements in school, and also tell him Marty's a bad influence.

Marty's parents refuse to move even though they know he has gotten beat up by Bobby ever since he was a kid. They don't even push him out of the house even though he's not in school anymore.

Donny's drugged up all the time and we don't even hear about his parents. Ali's parents take care of her kid for her while she goes out and screws everyone. Heather's always dropped off in rehab, but she gets out no problem.

Of course when they talk about killing Bobby they talk about it like kids. They haven't grown up. They don't truly understand what they're about to do. Only after the deed is done to they fully realize what murdering someone means.

Lisa talked about killing Bobby like it was just something that would make their lives convenient, but then after he's dead all she can smell is blood. I really liked the spot right before the Hitman swings the bat at Bobby's head when Marty tells Ali to turn off the light on the car.

No one should see this. It has become real. These kids didn't know what reality truly was. They thought life was all about sex and drugs. What more could there be? Clark tells the story with a sense that he doesn't completely make fun of these fools.

He's pretty compassionate about everything. We feel for Bobby in the scene where he dies. We feel the terror of the killers. We feel it all. Rachel Miner was completely awful, but everyone else put on great performances, especially Michael Pitt and Brad Renfro.

A really good film that ended up being better than I expected.