Lick the Star

This film reminds all of us over 20 what a pretentious and callous world revolves around the average junior high school student. In this case, an attractive and popular female teen exhorts a group of her peers to embark on a mission to poison certain boys in her class. After an initial period of bonding, the group forms a club of secrecy which revolves around a tattoo with a very special meaning, and with a sufficient dose of prodding from the leader, they set out to accomplish the mission. However, they soon find that there is no such thing as a secret amongst students in a junior high school. Filmed in black and white this movie is well directed and never lacks for maintaining ones interest.

I taught middle school for 43 years and watched as groups of girls developed these cliques. It generally was created by a single girl whose family had money and a boatload of permissiveness. There were the usual toadies, the hangers on, who followed these girls around. They were give their power by the others in the school. This captured a bit of it.

i never saw this film until after i saw sophia coppola's new film "Thirteen". They are very similar. They're both interesting, modern accounts of teenage girls. Moving to a degree and i think for the most part very well acted considering these are very young actresses and actors playing very emotionally unstable characters.

Sofia Coppola's 1998 short film "Lick the Star" is about a group of 7th grade mean girls who devise a bizarre plan to "make the boys weak" with arsenic. While that may sound strange, "Lick the Star" actually comes closer to the truth about junior high cliques than one might expect. Early scenes of the girls flaunting their new secret plan to the uninitiated are particularly powerful.

The short was shot at a real life junior high school and it shows, but its inky black-and-white visuals lend it a rather surreal beauty. That many scenes are accompanied by a fitting soundtrack of jangly girl-group rock is an added bonus. "Lick the Star" makes an agreeable 15 minutes or so, to say the least.

While it's a small film often shown on IFC, "Lick the Star" is an excellent, illuminating film shot in black & white by Lance Acord (who also worked with Coppola in her masterpiece "Lost in Translation" about a young 7th grade queen who becomes outcasted by her peers. Like "Lost in Translation" and "The Virgin Suicides", the theme of disconnection is predominant throughout the whole film. How a young girl is like a snob with all of her friends and one of them turns on her and in the process, things go to hell for the young woman. The film has an excellent soundtrack as well. For those who loved her full-length features, "Lick the Stars" is a must-see for any fan of Sofia Coppola who will be a director that will amaze us all.