Candy Jar

This is a drive-you-nuts pointless film with two annoying and abnormal private high schoolers, one male and one female who started a debate club and simply couldn't agree on anything with each other, and both would not back off from their two-member-only debate club for who should be the president of the club, who's more entitled either by birth date or seniority at school. The main purpose was to falsify on their college application with a title of a club presidency.

From the very beginning, we just have these two people blah, blah and blah to disagree on everything, chewing up lot of candy from the candy jars on their private school consultant's desk. We have so many phony and couldn't-care-less people at school, and two blindly support their kid's mothers.

We didn't see anything about the education, the study, the....No, nothing but constantly arguing between these two brats. It's just getting more and more annoying after awhile. This film is not about the generally normal kids in the public school system but two spoiled private high schoolers who never agreed on anything with each other. I just gave up sooner than later since I couldn't care less. Netflix may have a lot of money to burn, but they seem to have lost, more like whatever scripts they got, they'd put them into production, no matter what.

Lona and Bennett have been competing since kindergarten, maybe egged by their mothers who seem to have some issues that need to be resolved. And now college is beckoning them - Havard - or Yale - or not. Partly to look good on their CVs they are in the school debate club. But here everything gets very strange as competitive debating seems to have degenerated into a kind of bizarre speed talking contest in which points of evidence are made so fast that scarcely anyone understands.

Lona and Bennett are in some ways hugely similar and in others diametrically opposed so boy - girl, black - white, but both with single mothers, both geeks, bookworms, loners, and both very much attached to Kathy, a school counselor whose room is filled with the candy jars that give the film its title.

It's an unusual idea but it makes the film fresh and different. For me, the nonsensical debating process was a bit of a distraction, but maybe the very fact that we don't understand what they're struggling to achieve, let alone the actual arguments they make, maybe that helps us focus on them and how they matter more.

As a high school Junior enrolled in as many AP and honors courses as I can fit into a 7 period schedule struggling to find a spot into a university to have a successful, this movie is accurate; although, it is also dramaticized like many other films today. Many of my fellow students who are intelligent and successful oftentimes have trouble with communication and interpersonal skills, and some of their parents even have them take classes on learning how to interact with others. Our generation has come to a point where society pushes the need for perfection up our throats for so long we forget that it their and hurting many people's mental and physical condition. This movie draws attention to these issues in a lighthearted way that remains relevant. I recommend watching this just to gain an understanding of the stress, pressure, and hard work many high school students must do in order to gain "success".

Sweet and Smart, part love story, part life lessons Candy Jar is a charmer. A nice turn for both Jacob Latimore (The Chi), and Sami Gayle (Hateship/Loveship), who discover they are greater than the sum of their parts as they vie for a state championship in debate that could lead to admittance into their dream colleges. Light-hearted fare that definitely satisfies your sweet tooth.

My initial draw to this film was that these two characters would be debating with all the intense energy high schoolers are known for. That's a real feat to pull off well, the split second timing and in and outs of the debate topic. Turns out that this kind of 'debate' is based on READING your research as fast as you can for 8 minutes, there was no real debate, very annoying to listen to, and there was no real demonstration of their brillian minds, we have to take that on faith. Huge disappointment, and gave very little for the film to run on.

Other than that, it's your typical story of boy and girl that don't like each other until they fall for each other, and over achievers that spend all their time studying, and realize what they've been missing out on their life. Wasn't worth the time to watch. I think these actors had it in them to pull of real debates, but the creator / scriptwriters took the easy way out.