"Writer-director Don Roos' film has a gnarled wisdom about modern romance, straight and gay, that makes it a road-movie Chasing Amy, a Heathers for the whole post-nuclear family." (Time magazine).
Mighty praise indeed. Deserved? Well, it's no Heathers and its script isn't nearly as fine as Chasing Amy's. Our narrator and peroxide 'heroine' is teen tart Dedee Truitt (Christina Ricci). Dedee promptly warns us, "I don't have a heart of gold and I don't grow one later on. But relax. There are lots of nicer people coming up - we call them losers."
Dedee, 16 years of age going on 70, is pregnant and vicious with it. She ditches her dismal family life in Sucktart, Louisiana ("My mom was one of those mothers who's always telling her friends she's her daughter's best friend. Oh great, I used to think, not only do I have a shitty mom, but my best friend's a loser bitch.") to throw herself on the tender mercies of her gay half-brother (Martin Donovan), a small-town high school teacher. Once there, she seduces brother Bill's hunky lover Matt (Ivan Sergei) and takes off for California with the befuddled Matt in tow. Hot on their heels are Bill; Lucia (Lisa Kudrow), a fellow teacher with a yen for Bill; the earnest father of Dedee's baby (William Scott Lee); and local sheriff Carl Tippett (Lyle Lovett).
Dennis Price's narrator in Kind Hearts and Coronets was wicked, dastardly and captivating. Ricci, an actress who is usually sensational (had a recent barnstorming performance in The Ice Storm), is by contrast nasty, evil and tiresome. Throughout she informs us at which points to feel emotion. An interesting, but not engaging technique. However, her turn of phrase is even less appealing: "If you don't breathe in, you can do anything for ten minutes" or "A blow job is a blow job."
With Ricci laying it on far too thick, the pleasure in this confused, slightly inconsequential film lies with Donovan, the king of American indie cinema, and Friends' Kudrow. Donovan's careful, studied performance never hints at schmaltz and counterbalances the film's more crass characters. Kudrow also equips herself extremely well, playing an uptight, sexually repressed school madam. She gets the best lines: [On The Sound of Music] "I just want to stuff that guitar up that nun's arse" and "Matt, that is not your baby. It's some other idiot's, who probably has an eighth grade education and a trunk full of Waco pamphlets."
Minus Ricci, the main character, this may have made an engaging one-hour TV special. As it is, The Opposite of Sex, is a mess with the odd funny line and two fine performances.
Ben Walsh
Mighty praise indeed. Deserved? Well, it's no Heathers and its script isn't nearly as fine as Chasing Amy's. Our narrator and peroxide 'heroine' is teen tart Dedee Truitt (Christina Ricci). Dedee promptly warns us, "I don't have a heart of gold and I don't grow one later on. But relax. There are lots of nicer people coming up - we call them losers."
Dedee, 16 years of age going on 70, is pregnant and vicious with it. She ditches her dismal family life in Sucktart, Louisiana ("My mom was one of those mothers who's always telling her friends she's her daughter's best friend. Oh great, I used to think, not only do I have a shitty mom, but my best friend's a loser bitch.") to throw herself on the tender mercies of her gay half-brother (Martin Donovan), a small-town high school teacher. Once there, she seduces brother Bill's hunky lover Matt (Ivan Sergei) and takes off for California with the befuddled Matt in tow. Hot on their heels are Bill; Lucia (Lisa Kudrow), a fellow teacher with a yen for Bill; the earnest father of Dedee's baby (William Scott Lee); and local sheriff Carl Tippett (Lyle Lovett).
Dennis Price's narrator in Kind Hearts and Coronets was wicked, dastardly and captivating. Ricci, an actress who is usually sensational (had a recent barnstorming performance in The Ice Storm), is by contrast nasty, evil and tiresome. Throughout she informs us at which points to feel emotion. An interesting, but not engaging technique. However, her turn of phrase is even less appealing: "If you don't breathe in, you can do anything for ten minutes" or "A blow job is a blow job."
With Ricci laying it on far too thick, the pleasure in this confused, slightly inconsequential film lies with Donovan, the king of American indie cinema, and Friends' Kudrow. Donovan's careful, studied performance never hints at schmaltz and counterbalances the film's more crass characters. Kudrow also equips herself extremely well, playing an uptight, sexually repressed school madam. She gets the best lines: [On The Sound of Music] "I just want to stuff that guitar up that nun's arse" and "Matt, that is not your baby. It's some other idiot's, who probably has an eighth grade education and a trunk full of Waco pamphlets."
Minus Ricci, the main character, this may have made an engaging one-hour TV special. As it is, The Opposite of Sex, is a mess with the odd funny line and two fine performances.
Ben Walsh