Books, Arts & Manners: Will Kids Be Kids?

The trouble with American moviemaking is that it is virtually impossible to turn out an honest piece of work any more. Costs have escalated well beyond sky-high (call it Warren-Beatty-and-Dustin-Hoffman-high), and sufficient returns are possible only if you can capture either the total youth audience or a fair cross-section of all possible audiences: young and old, urban and rural, illiterate and educated, assuming that the last-named category still exists. In the first case, you have to start with something infantile and stick to it as close as a Siamese twin; in the second, you begin as a whirling dervish trying to confront viewers from all points on the horizon, and end up dizzily staggering, exhausted, lost.

Take the case of what at least tries to be an adult movie—although, of course, with much of it aimed at the youth audience—River’s Edge. Directed by Tim Hunter, whose earlier film, Tex, was straight youth exploitation, and written by Neil Jimenez when still in his early twenties, River’s Edge tries to be an honest look at Middle American kids unmoored and drifting into disaster. It begins by focusing on a 12year-old, Tim (why does he bear the director’s name?); with his long hair, earring, and baby fat, we cannot at first glance tell what sex he is, though there is little doubt of his being up to no good. In fact, this grey dawn, he is pitching his sister’s favorite doll into the river. The locale, although the story is based on events in a Northern California high school, is left deliberately indeterminate. As Tim looks across to the other bank, he sees Samson, alias John, a huge, fat 16-year-old, sitting in front of something white and letting out strangulated howls.

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John Simon

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The trouble with American moviemaking is that it is virtually impossible to turn out an honest piece of work any more. Costs have escalated well beyond sky-high (call it Warren-Beatty-and-Dustin-Hoffman-high), and sufficient returns are possible only if you can capture either the total youth audience or a fair cross-section of all possible audiences: young and old, urban and rural, illiterate and educated, assuming that the last-named category still exists. In the first case, you have to start with something infantile and stick to it as close as a Siamese twin; in the second, you begin as a whirling dervish trying to confront viewers from all points on the horizon, and end up dizzily staggering, exhausted, lost.

Take the case of what at least tries to be an adult movie—although, of course, with much of it aimed at the youth audience—River’s Edge. Directed by Tim Hunter, whose earlier film, Tex, was straight youth exploitation, and written by Neil Jimenez when still in his early twenties, River’s Edge tries to be an honest look at Middle American kids unmoored and drifting into disaster. It begins by focusing on a 12year-old, Tim (why does he bear the director’s name?); with his long hair, earring, and baby fat, we cannot at first glance tell what sex he is, though there is little doubt of his being up to no good. In fact, this grey dawn, he is pitching his sister’s favorite doll into the river. The locale, although the story is based on events in a Northern California high school, is left deliberately indeterminate. As Tim looks across to the other bank, he sees Samson, alias John, a huge, fat 16-year-old, sitting in front of something white and letting out strangulated howls.