Psychobitch

This film is a really sensitive and genuine look at confronting your own insecurities and the fact that you might unknowlingly be hiding your true self from even those who are closest to you.

Yes, there is this cheesy love story about "falling in love with the whimsical girl from school that no one understands" that ties it all together, but it goes a lot deeper than that. The main character is forced to confront his own insecurity with how he presents himself to his friends/family/school, if he wants to be with the girl that he really loves. Sometimes making true love work isn't easy and sometimes through that work we do we discover hard truths about ourselves.

Marius is a good boy. He's good in school, he always does what he's told and what's expected of him. We as the audience are never exactly told if he's happy with that, but we suspect that he's not. In comes Frida, the new girl in school who, rumour has it, had tried to commit suicide. She's the exact opposite, she never does what she's told and shows some very rude behaviour. For a class project, a techer asks Marius to team up with Frida and although he's not thrilled, he can't say no., so he awkwardly tries to engage with Frida. Being strong-willed, Frida plays with Marius and makes him do things that are completely against his nature, even things that are forbidden. Not to spoil anything, you can guess that a teen romance eventlually leads to them falling in love, not without complications like the girl Marius used to date before he met Frida.

The core message of the movie is that our society wishes for children to be like Marius, but in order to be happy they need to develop their own character and do what makes them happy, even if it doesn't always make their parents happy.

My main criticism is that both the characters of Marius and Frida were too extreme to be entirely credible, Marius too boring and Frida too impulsive, but I guess the director wanted it this way to drive home the "opposites attract" thing. My teenager days are long gone, but still I found the movie entertaining, the acting was solid and while I wouldn't pay to see it in a cinema, the time watching it on tv was not wasted. Of course the movie is aimed at teenagers and parents with teenage children.

Psychobitch is one of those high school romance stories that aspires to be socially relevant by exploring mental illness and manages to do that to some extent. However, the forced wickedness that one finds in the characters of Frida and Marius make the drama look like it was concocted just to make that point. But, it is still fun to watch as these characters fool around together in a brutal high school setting where making fun of each other and gossiping is the average order. There are a few palpable sequences (some funny, some serious) that you will take away from Psychobitch but anything more than that will be a stretch. TN.

This is a fabulous new film which can't fail to disappoint if you have ever had young love and/or had trouble in deciding which life to lead! Great acting & directing, although some of the camerawork is a bit dodgy. One of the best things about this film is it's got an acceptable run time. Other films I've seen with similar storylines are too short & often only 80mins or so, but this one is 30mins more giving plenty of time to explore the lives of the main characters and let the viewers settle in. The soundtrack is good too and tracks mostly fall at the correct place. Well worth a watch, highly recommended.

For me this was thoroughly entertaining, great story.

So Marius academically is the school brains that is looked up to by other students, outgoing and in with the crowd. Frida however is the opposite, she seems to have a careless attitude, loner who has it turns out is just miss understood ?.

Already mentioned in the synopsis, Marius and Frida are paired up to study, but being so different from each other, easier said then done.

The overall story is excellent, although Marius is intelligent, I am assuming he is fifteen, as all obviously in his year, he struggles to be honest how he feels about Frida, naïve and immature, but its very well acted out.

However there are some serious issues covered amidst the storylines that are concerning for a 13+ audience.