The Dirties

After watching "The Dirties", I'm pretty impressed. You can tell that this is a pretty low budget film, and it proves that no matter what a film's budget it, it can still be very impactful.

The final moments of "The Dirties" are very disturbing. There's not as much gruesome violence as one might expect from a film that is essentially about a school shooting, but it is still terrifying, and works better without any blood and gore.

While the movie is very dark and disturbing, don't expect the film to be completely void of any entertainment value. It almost starts off like a dark comedy, with many amusing bits and characters. This IS a genuinely funny film...but it doesn't stay like that for long. The scenes towards the climax are very intense, and as the film progresses we realize more and more that the main character is a legitimate psychopath.

There's some flaws in the film, mainly having to due with technical issues that I had. For example, there's a lot of the cameraman zooming in and out to annoying effect. But, other than those little flaws, the movie is spectacular and highly recommended!

Director Kevin Smith, who released The Dirties through his self-proclaimed "movie club," has called the film "the most important movie you will see all year" and he isn't wrong. The Dirties is a harrowing look at a subject no one wants to explore and that is the school shooting. Here is a film that takes such a subject and subverts it to the point of being believable and so naturalistic it possesses a rare documentary-style. The fact that it will go largely unseen by the public is a crime.

The film stars Matt Johnson, who also serves as director, co-producer, and co-writer, as Matt along with Owen Williams as Owen, two senior film geeks in high school. They are making a film project about a lawless gang called "the dirties," which is also the name they give to the school bullies who humiliatingly beat them up and harass them whenever they get the chance. When their film project on the gang is gutted by their film teacher for its excessive use of violence and language, Matt suggests they come up with a film where they actually kill the bullies in their school. Like, for real. Owen believes Matt is joking but quietly consents to devising the mad plan for the "fun" of it.

Owen, however, comes to the realization that Matt isn't fooling around. He has resorted to taking pictures of the people that bully them, trace rooms and the bullies' schedules on the blueprints of the school he obtained at the town village, and talking openly about the potential of his carnage with Owen as if he's achieving personal enjoyment from it. Matt makes it clear he doesn't want to go after everyone in the school; just those who caused him and his friend untold misery by mocking them when they were nothing but harmless and obeying.

First-time director Johnson employs the popular film school tactic that will either captivate or alienate you upon its arrival and it's the shaky camera. The camera is obviously hand-held and held very loosely it is. Never does it restrict the environment, as it always seems to capture the right images at the right time. The effect only furthers the already naturalistic acting and dialog in the film. Much of the dialog, like many indies nowadays, was improvised and in a school setting focusing on two kids, one of whom is quietly out of control, this seems like the only method to achieve success through dialog.

It's also worth noting that Johnson's unsteady camera-hand always provides for an unsettling environment. It's hard to make a public school ominous, but with bullies and an unstable character in the forefront, along with directing that reserves as much as it shows, it's not too difficult. The film is so successful at being unsettling thanks to its camera-work that when the inevitable occurs it's almost not as frightening as what we've already indulged in. Then the last line is said that will ring in your head for days to come.

The Dirties works best thematically because it doesn't try to justify its characters, its antagonists, its events, or its cultural importance. It doesn't look to provide answers because there are no clear one. It doesn't look to embellish or sensationalize because it knows this kind of event occurs, unfortunately, very often. It doesn't become politically-partisan, blame mental illness, blame the quality of parenting, or blame news and media. It simply shows the depressing and shocking effects bullying can have on a soul.

A heartbreaking scene comes when Matt and Owen are talking about how they've been bullied for many years but still haven't really learned to cope with it. Matt states that one day, in middle school, he was putting quarters in a vending machine when someone made fun of his dated sweatpants. Matt remarks about how he walked away with fifty-cents credited on the machine, not even putting more money in or walking away with any food or drink. It was the first time he was bullied for being himself, and the pain and torment hasn't ceased since then.

Constantly I was reminded of Gus Van Sant's Elephant, a highly-impressionistic film that based itself off of the tragedy at Columbine High School. The film featured little dialog, pretty empty characters, and scenes that didn't blatantly say their purpose - all of which an intentional tactic on Van Sant's part. The film was harrowing in its simplicity and compelling in its suspense that something was about to happen that was going to affect hundreds of young people differently. The Dirties exercises in a more open fashion, but, thankfully, leaves a lot of questions unanswered. At only eighty-minutes, it had the power and impact on me I don't usually get from films two hours or longer.

NOTE: The Dirties is now available on various video-on-demand outlets and will receive a DVD release later this year.

Starring: Matt Johnson and Owen Williams. Directed by: Matt Johnson.

The Dirties is a film about two high school boys. They are given an assignment to make a movie and choose a plot that deals with taking down a gang of people called "The Dirties" who are bullies, troublemakers and like the title suggests, they are generally dirty folks. When they finish their film and present it, the boys, who are already victims of bullying, see an escalation of abuse. This triggers one of the boys, who loved filming their movie, starts taking the plot of the film and planning an attack on his real life bullies.

This film is simplistic but I really liked that. It brought a realism and showed the progressive mental decline through how these boys were being treated. It was intereting to see the relationship between the friends begin to change and even though there was concern, there was still a naive position that everything was going to be okay.

Bullying is a terrible thing and it is never really about the person that is being picked on. There is something going on within the bully that makes that person believe that by the mistreatment of others his or her own status is elevated. It is even more sad that people stand by quietly allowing the mistreatment of others to take place. Children/teens have not yet reached a point in their mental development to understand why someone would do these things to them and most of it is internalized and will eventually show itself in other ways. In this situation it was shown through seeking revenge.

I thought that this was an excellent film. It was simple and direct. We have to do a better job in making sure that we aren't just saving kids from bullying but also saving the bullies from whatever is making them feel the need to tear someone else down.

I've had the pleasure to see this movie in a semi-private screening with the crew present. Part of the high rating (by my standards) is the fact that the flick's as self-made as self-made gets, being produced and acted by basically the same guys (which is something I often dig).

The movie throws the viewer directly into its documentary-styled collage of at first glance seemingly random scenes featuring two best friends during their high school time. The first half hour develops a pull that draws you right in. While "Two best friends are filming a comedy about getting revenge on the bullies at their high school. One of them isn't joking." is probably as concise as it gets to describe the plot, it also means that a somewhat experienced audience might feel a bit underwhelmed, since what started off fresh will become rather foreseeable and and clichéd in the second half. I was relieved that the ending's at least consequent, finishing the movie in a satisfying way nonetheless.

I like the concept of the movie and mostly like the execution, and I like being able to say that it's a film worthy of watching with high schoolers, since it provides a lot of stuff to discuss about things that are important to know and realize for each and everyone out there.

The Dirties has been garnering rave reviews and collecting awards at multiple film festivals and for good reason. It's a powerful, engaging and important film. Two high school best friends, Matt and Owen, decide to make a movie project for class where they pretend to murder the group of boys who routinely harass them. Matt is played by Matthew Johnson who also wrote and directed the film. It was filmed at a real high school with actual students so the line between reality and fiction is significantly blurred. Matt is an outsider but one that viewers can relate to, with his quips and love for movies. This makes it all the more disturbing when he begins to take the murder plot too seriously and takes action that will change his life, as well as the lives of all those around him, forever. This movie is not just about a school shooting. It's about consequences, it's about friendship, it's about loneliness. It's definitely a must see.