Bully: Juventude violenta

Marty and Bobby are friends who work together, drink together, pick up girls together and hustle together. The dynamics of their friendship is not that straightforward though as Bobby is by far the dominant one and thinks nothing of demeaning and bullying Marty and having fun exploiting anyone he sees as below him. While highschool drop out Marty gets Lisa pregnant, Bobby's future looks good with college and his father's support ahead of him – all this despite raping Lisa's friend Ali. When enough is enough Bobby's friends decide to kill him.

I'm not sure what it is about Larry Clark and teenage sex and nudity but he does seem to have made it a career motif – sometimes to good effect (Kids) and sometimes in a way that is exploitative and nasty (the horrid Teenage Caveman springs to mind). However with good reviews I figured that perhaps Bully would be able to have the sexual material within a context. The result here is a rather mixed approach where the true story does necessitate the depiction of teen sex and drug use however Clark does push this more than he really needs to with shots of nude girls on the toilet, graphic drug use and one or two "upskirt" shots of girls' underwear that a gonzo pornographer would have been proud of. Fortunately his subject is good enough to prevent it become shocking for shocking's sake. The narrative is interesting because of it being true but it didn't develop the characters well enough to make this as fascinating as it should have been. Instead of doing this for the first half, we instead just see lots of actions (nudity, fighting, drugs) which fills the time but is not the same as writing good characters. The overuse of nudity in this part is excessive and rather tiring and I did start to feel that Clark maybe doesn't understand his characters but he does know from the reports what they did, so this is what show.

The part of the film that occurs after the murder is much more interesting and convincing and this helps cover the weaknesses of the first part. For all Clark's excesses in his films he does know how to draw good performances from his young casts. Stahl is impressive in the lead and does the best he can with his character producing some nice contradictions within this boy – shame that Clark isn't that interested in this. Renfro is not quite as convincing a person although he does work well as the slightly weak-willed loser. Phillips is better while Miner is a straightforward character – with both of them I felt a bit uncomfortable watching them be naked so often as they were. The rest of the cast are all as realistic and natural and, although they come over as stoned out losers and the dregs of youth culture but then that was the point I suppose.

Overall then an impacting film but nowhere near as insightful or as important as it should have been. Instead of delving into the subject, Clark is happy to just show us how they lived – with lots of sex and drug use, which was necessary to a point but shouldn't have been allowed to be as much of the show as it was. Worth a look for those used to Clark's approach but not as good as it should have been.

I watched this movie because I had seen Kids and thought that it was a pretty well directed movie. I base a lot of my movie viewing on directors and I figured that I would give Larry Clark a shot. I knew nothing about the movie before viewing it, I didn't even read the back of the DVD. This movie was one of the most astonishing films I have ever seen and I have seen a whole lot of them. The fact that it is based on a true story amplifies the impact. I will definitely read the book that it is based on and would recommend this film to my peers. As a warning, there is a good bit of nudity, strong language, and violence. But if you can sit through it, its worth it!

I loved the way Kid's presented itself when it was first released, if I had it my way then that film would be shown to all the kids in high school's all over the world because the reality of what is going on in each character really hits home when watching this and I think it might make a lot of young kids think before what they do. Anyway that was my introduction to Larry Clark and the amazing Leo Fitzpatrick and when I had heard not long ago that these two got together and made another harrowing teen film called Bully I just had to watch it but apart of me wishes I didn't watch it because I scared me in a way because of how real it was. Leo Fitzpatrick is not the lead star in this one though, this one is left to Brad Renfro (Marty) and Nick Stahl (Bobby) who are two best friends who live in world where they sell phone sex for gay people and make homosexual films to sell to porn shops, just you're average teenager of course, but Bobby is a dominating friend towards Marty and Marty just breaks and decides with his vulnerable girlfriend that they should kill Bobby so he won't be a problem in their lives, from there we are taken into this dark tale of teenage revenge. There is a big build to what happens in this film and that's what makes it harrowing viewing because you just don't know what is going to happen. But by the time the film had ended I straight away bombarded the internet with information about the real happening of what actually went on.

Overall this is Larry Clark's best work to date and it opens you up to a whole new world of talented actors and a director that should be praised more about his work. This is not the sort of film that finishes and you go on with what you are doing, it will stay in your head for a while and will leave wanting more in way because you really feel that you want the film to go on a bit longer to know more about these fascinating characters.

I watched this movie five days ago and I'm still affected by it. Afterwards all I could do was cry for the youth of America, because this isn't just some movie. It really, truly happened. The actors turn in outstanding performances as teenagers with nothing to do but turn to sex and drugs to fill the empty voids in their lives. Nick Stahl is particularly amazing as Bobby, the boarder-line psychotic who tormented his friends until they could take it no more.This is a sad, realistic look at how many teenagers really do act with their peers. Don't look for your typical teenager fare here because you won't find it. The language, sex, and drug use may bother some people, but thats because no one wants to believe that young adults can be this way. Well, I got out of high school two years ago and I can tell you that this is not far from reality. Thats probably why it has affected me so much...because I know that stuff portrayed in this movie really does happen. This is a great movie. Watch it. Then go tell your kids you love them.

Raw, realistic, deeply disturbing and haunting film about a group of recently graduated high school kids whose lives are aimless and empty. With nothing better to do, they get together to plot the murder of their mean best friend (Nick Stahl), who was the only one bound for college and to make something of himself. With none of your usual Hollywood gloss and a well selected cast (especially Stahl in a creepy performance), this film has many powerful moments and completely draws you into it's story. Shockingly enough, based on a true story.

Unrated; Strong Sexual Content, Graphic Violence, Profanity, and Nudity.