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Dancing_P [ 8.0 ]
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Another movie about teenage alienation; do not pass go, do not collect two hundred dollars. It's true that on the surface, Pump Up the Volume has nothing to distinguish it from Sixteen Candles and its Hughes-helmed brethren. The resemblances, however, end there. PUTV (as it shall henceforth be called) is an angry, provocative film about teenagers; it's Lindsay Anderson's If... reimagined for 1990. It's true that the film's methods (pirate radio is a thing of the past) and music (Leonard Cohen and The Pixies would be replaced by Korn and 50 Cent today) are dated, but its message is not. How can it ever be?
Mark Hunter (Christian Slater) is a shy teenager living in Arizona. Having recently moved out, he has no friends and keeps to himself at school; at night, however, he becomes pirate radio shock jock Happy Harry Hard-On, adored by most of his high school. After a listener commits suicide following Harry's on-air indifference, the show becomes a scapegoat for everything that is going wrong at the highschool.
As the film progressed, I mistakenly took its message to be the typical teen mantra: No one understands me, I'm all alone, I'm the only one who has to go through all of this. But it digs deeper and hits a raw nerve somewhere along the line; as pathetic and clichéd as it sounds, director/writer Allan Moyle really captures what it's like to be a teenager. It's true that the film is not always subtle; it falls into that oh-so-familiar trap of making all the adult characters talk and act like ridiculous automatons (except, of course, for the token in-touch adult) and ends with a car chase... sort of.
The concept of the radio show is one that I find innately fascinating on film because it permits your characters to voice their opinions and feelings in ways that you can't get through voice-overs, for example, or straight dialogue. Slater is excellent, although he looks a little awkward when playing shy and Samantha Mathis is also terrific as Happy Harry's #1 fan. If you look closely, you'll spot a 15-year-old Seth Green (sporting an intense mullet) as the kid who gets the tape to play on the PA. Seriously underrated as far as teen movies go.
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jim [ 8.0 ]
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Through no fault of its own, this film has lost a lot of resonance in the years since its release. In 1990 no one knew that the Internet would become the next great medium of mass communication, and no one knew that Columbine and other cases of school violence would make "talking hard" seem such a tame--almost quaint--manifestation of teenage rebellion.
Christian Slater's performance is enough to ensure that Pump Up the Volume retains an edge, despite some moments of clunkiness in the screenplay and despite the fact the corrosive cynicism of the beginning melts into one more take on "Everybody Needs Somebody to Love." But as much as I liked this film when it first came out, it already has the feel of an interesting period piece as opposed to a timeless classic.
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| Weighted Rating | : 6.7 |
| No. Ratings | : 8 | |
| No. Reviews | : 4 | |
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