Fuga dalla scuola media

WELCOME TO THE DOLLHOUSE (1996) **** Heather Matarazzo, Brian Sexton Jr., Eric Mabius, Matthew Faber, Daria Kalinina, Angela Pietropinto. Easily one of the best independent films ever produced. Matarazzo is brilliant perfection as 11 year old Dawn Wiener - Wiener Dog - who is trying desperately to survive the 7th grade NJ suburban hell with her existence as a gawky, nerdy yet smarter- than-the-rest protagonist facing every conceivable roadblock to hurdle including a dimwitted hunky high schooler and a seemingly threatening classmate (Sexton who is also great) who can't decide if he wants to "rape" her. Heartbreaking and all too close to the bone perfectly realized depiction of how judgemental we all are and just how harrowing adolescence really is. Dare not to be angered when her self-indulgent mother takes away her cake at the dinner table while the rest of the monstrous family greedily eat their desserts. Black comedy satire and documentarian genres blending seamlessly to a genuine masterpiece of poignancy sharply observant parable of anomie and angst by writer and director Todd Solondz (who won the Best Picture prize at Sundance). Wickedly funny and dead on accurate.

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.

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 fresh, creative, no frills pic about a junior high school girl who is the personification of "uncool". This poignant film could be dark comedy, light drama, satire or even farce depending on how its interpreted. However that may be, it shows in painful detail the assassination of the self esteem of a sweet, kind, and thoughtful girl who wants little more than to be liked. Entertaining as it may be, "...Dollhouse" is a movie with a message for everyone who has ever been 12.

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.