Award-winning director Kirby Dick gave video cameras to 10 students to record their lives at Los Angeles's John Marshall High School (the same high school used in the filming of Grease and Buffy the Vampire Slayer) -- with no limitations on what they could shoot. After one week, the cameras were given to 10 new students, and so on, forming a virtual chain letter and a portrait of young America at the turn of the 21st century.
Absorbing in places, but considering the large and diverse pool the filmmakers had to draw from, it's a surprisingly repetitive and predictable collection of big-city sagas.
While I thought this was an interesting look into the lives of high schoolers in LA I didn't think it was a great flick.It is disturbing to see most of these kids acting the way they were knowing that people would be viewing these videos. Candid talk about sex, drugs, and crime shocked me as none of these kids were
even 18.We even see two of the folks doing drugs in the film. To me it seems as if most of the kids have already given up and resigned themselves to live out life with the idea that they can do no better than where they find themselves now. I really hope my kids don't fall into that trap as well.
May 20, 2009
Jason Spencer
Super Reviewer
This film is mildly interesting if watched with lots of fast-forwarding.
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