Willkommen im Tollhaus

Welcome to the Dollhouse is an excellent film. It shows, in a strictly un-opinionated manner, a young girl's experiences as one of the unpopular kids in her junior high-school. She is faced with the extreme viciousness commonly shown in schools towards the students who, for whatever reason, don't fit in. The film never attempts to go any deeper than simply displaying these occurences to us, never really analyzing them or questioning why things like that happen. It just shows what is, what we've all experienced or at least seen, and for that I think it's all the more effective.

There are also some humorous moments thrown in, which I thought were nice and somewhat alleviated the otherwise depressing mood of the film (not that I'm complaining).

Welcome to the Dollhouse is a great snapshot of human behaviour. That's the best way I can describe it.

Todd Solandz's first feature is a dead-on accurate exploration of geek childhood as seen through the bespecled lenses of the nerdy Dawn Wiener (Heather Matarazzo). Dawn's rotten school life is compounded by the fact that an older guy at school is targeting her for extracurricular rape. He hasn't quite decided if he's really going to bury the sausage in Dawn, but he's sure getting off on the anxiety he's generating. At home, Dawn must compete with her cute, feisty, outrageously indulged sister Missy (the irrepressible Daria Kalinina), a beauty pageant wanna-be if ever there was one, and a mother she has a huge disconnection issue with. Dawn's life is such a living hell the rape looks like it might be an interesting diversion. Solandz followed this up with the terrific "Happiness", an exploration of a more adult hell. Though the subject matter of "Dollhouse" is incendiary, the nihilism is sautéed in the blackest of humor and deep sympathy for the characters. A true original.

... and I somewhat agree with another reviewer who said Dawn's teacher should be euthanized. Except euthanasia is a final release for animals to end their suffering. I expect better from grown women who should have more empathy, if not why are they in teaching? And Dawn's parents - they have no respect or regard for her as a human being whatsoever. She is just a disappointing outgrowth of themselves while they pay attention to Dawn's older brother Mark, who is somewhat like a teenage Bill Gates - an intellectual looking for activities to put on a college application to an Ivy League school, but with zero consideration for anybody but himself. They also dote on Dawn's younger daughter, who although she is only about eight knows she is beautiful and liked and uses it as a weapon against her older sister Dawn. She'll no doubt grow up to be married to a Wall Streeter and be president of her HOA, spending her days measuring the height of other peoples' lawns. So as for the parents AND her teacher - stake them out to an ant hill covered in honey. They deserve it.

Dawn Weiner is a 13 year old girl bullied by the entire junior high school, who write obscene things on her locker due to her unfortunate last name, throw spitballs in her hair, question her sexual identity to embarrass her, and even the tough girls confront her and assault her in the bathroom. She is safe nowhere. Nobody has her back and she only exists to be a source of mirth or scorn to everybody else. A less than. She talks to whoever will talk to her, including a boy who introduces himself by threatening sexual assault. I've heard some people say they "want to shake some sense into her". But she is 13. What do you expect of somebody who has her life as an experience of what the human race is like?

And then she strikes back, in what appears to be a small but passive aggressive way, and suddenly the film segues into an episode of Law & Order SVU, something Dawn was not intending. I'll let you watch and see how this all works out.

Dawn is a young girl who is bullied. Of course she is is clueless. She'll arrive at college clueless because she'll never have the confidence building experiences that would cure her cluelessness. This film is essential viewing but be warned it is an exhausting tragedy.

Grimly convincing portrayal of life in junior high school for the unpopular. If you aren't blown away by how realistic this is then you weren't unpopular enough: this is the real deal.

This movie strips away the rosy patina of nostalgia that covers most other films that portray the grim nature of childhood. I admire the film for avoiding the common trap of making the lead an innocent victim. Heather is, when the opportunity arises, just as cruel as anyone else in the film. The movie doesn't make Heather a child, but instead makes her a confused human being full of conflicting emotions such as hatred, lust, anguish and guilt.

I think to understand this movie though, you need to realize that you are viewing everything from Heather's point of view. Teachers and parents are ridiculously unfair, classmates are alarmingly sadistic, and you could point at some action and say, oh, I doubt that would happen, but there's a strong emotional truth; this is what it feels like to be an unhappy child.

When I watch movies about unpopular kids, I am always disappointed because their lives are better than mine was, and this is the first movie I could point to and say, if you want to see what I was dealing with in Junior High, watch Dollhouse. But while I always wanted a movie that shows the unvarnished truth, it is really difficult to watch. Although if you can make it through the first half hour it gets just a shade less horrific. And it does have a quirky sense of humor that lightens it some. I avoided this movie for years because I was afraid it would be too painful, and a friend said no, it's not that painful, and she was sort of right and sort of wrong. But it's definitely worth seeing.

"Welcome to the Dollhouse" is a feel-bad movie with little to make most viewers smile. It's depressing, awful and painful to watch. It's also incredibly insightful and incredibly well made.

Heather Matarazzo stars as Dawn, a miserable kid who just began middle school. She's not particularly pretty, nor talented nor self- assured. The other kids are incredibly nasty and take full advantage of her insecurities, her teacher could use euthanizing and her mother is a complete jerk...and as a result Dawn is depressed and lost. The film follows her during part of the school year and by the end, her life still seems to suck...just as much as when the film began.

So why do I give this miserable film an 8? Well, writer/director Todd Solondz really understands kids this age...and most Hollywood films completely get kids this age wrong! They usually make them too smart, too self-aware and too happy...which is great if you are a movie star but not reality. Here, however, Solondz explores what life can be like for kids who feel like outsiders...which is incredibly tough at that age. The only negative is that there really is no ending to this story...Dawn is still miserable, her mother still is a terrible parent and things look like it's just going to be more of the same. But wow...what an incredibly well made little film!