3.0/10. There’s an interesting line of thought that’s come up lately with the glut of remakes and reboots in recent years – instead of remaking good or even great films, films that make the most of their premises with great acting, direction, and storytelling, we should be remaking bad films with good ideas behind them. It’s unlikely to happen, because the reason films get remade and rebooted – specifically, that they represent a recognizable brand name studios hope will be enough to lure you into the theater on goodwill alone – suggest that bad films, even bad films with noteworthy premises or story ideas, won’t have the economic features that would convince the commercial side of moviemaking to redo them.

But if there’s ever been a film crying out for this very brand of remake, it’s *Heathers*. The film is notable enough that you’ve probably heard of it, or at least heard of other movies that followed in its wake. It’s not so close to people’s hearts that you’re likely to get the tired “ruined my childhood” backlash. And most of all, it has the kernel of a good idea – a dark comedy that satirizes the high school ecosystem and the reactions to teenage tragedy – but executes it in a godawful fashion.

The easiest flaws are in the dialogue and the acting. The film does its best to approximate teenspeak, with a motley assortment of cheesy slang that feels like am embryonic version of the same idea employed in *Juno* with about a tenth of the charm or delivery. Nobody in the film does a particularly good job of spitting out that nonsense.

Winona Ryder comes the closest as the film’s protagonist, but even the talented young actress can’t really muster up the conviction to make the hammy exchanges that are the film’s stock-in-trade land. Opposite Ryder is Christian Slater, whose creepy bad boy routine is half-Jack Nicholson and half-Jonathan Taylor Thomas. He’s supposed to provide the film’s dark ballast, but his performance quickly crosses over into eye-roll territory. Between the weak writing and the hammy performances, anytime someone’s speaking the movie is nigh-excruciating.

The same issues infect the film’s tone. There’s a cartoony, almost dreamlike quality to the film, which works well enough for a satire that’s not meant to be taken too seriously. The problem becomes when the film wants you to connect with the characters and their emotional struggles. It’s difficult to buy into Veronica’s guilt over her role in the murder of her rivals when the whole effort feels pulled out of a Bugs Bunny cartoon. It’s hard too to put too much stock in her having this grand realization about not turning her back on the nerds and geeks of the school when her relationship with Betty Finn is established solely through weak exposition. It’s hard to care much about the establishment and dissolution of Veronica’s relationship with J.D. when it happens in a flash of clichés and falls apart just as quickly.

There is, admittedly, something subversive about taking the idea of teens struggling within the Darwinian confines of high school and making that survival of the fittest contest literal. There’s also some darkly rich material about teenage tragedy being twisted and put on a pedestal by oblivious communities and the media outlets that serve them. But the latter is much better explored with more realism and conviction in films like *World’s Greatest Dad* and the former is drowned in a sea of broad performances and even weaker writing.

What’s more, the power of the subversion is lost in how shallow and cornball the movie’s take on these themes is. There’s no depth to the characters, with each standing as empty archetypes in a way that could work for a disposable teen comedy, but falters in one that is, at least purportedly, attempting to Say Something™. As transgressive as it is to depict teenagers brandish weapons and planting bombs in a high school, and as much as it shocks the conscience when watching the film in a post-Columbine world, *Heathers* wastes any power this imagery may have, any opportunity to really comment on the challenges high school students face within their social circles, by making its alleged subversiveness only skin deep, creating a film that’s awash in the hacky tropes and thin-characters it means to satirize. The result is a movie that’s filed with the surface-level details of something that really crosses boundaries, but lacks the substance or the maturity to use that to any meaningful end.

If there’s one thing to say in favor of this slog of a film, it’s that there’s a sense of visual flair to *Heathers* that helps mask its otherwise notable creative bankruptcy. The color-coding among the main characters makes for interesting costume choices and well-composed shots that create a candy-coated world and an array of bright, colorful images. At the same time, cinematographer Kenny Hill helps establish the dreamlike quality of the film by giving it an almost oversaturated, gauzy hue that contributes to the outsized tone of the film, however confused it may be. Given the film’s aesthetic merits and the lackluster quality of its script, *Heathers* may be a film best watched on mute.

Perhaps it suggests a lack of imagination to imagine Joss Whedon or David Robert Mitchell or Diablo Cody taking this same premise and spin *Heathers* director Michael Lehmann’s straw into gold. But for a film that’s such a misfire, there’s the germ of something worthwhile that *Heathers* only grazes over the course of the movie. In scenes where the unpopular, mostly silent Martha “Dumptruck” Dunnstock is bullied, is embarrassed, and seeks to find a way out, the film taps into the core of the destructive teenage experience it’s so desperately trying to grasp in the rest of the film’s runtime.

The day-to-day lives of highschoolers, and the peculiar social structures that emerge from young people trying to figure out who they are in relation to one another in that awkward stage between childhood and adulthood is rife for exploration and humor. The same is true of the way that the tragedies that befall teenagers are glamorized and fetishized. Unfortunately, all *Heathers* can offer on this front is a cheesy, poorly-written attempt to dig into the complexity and gallows humor of these subjects. Maybe someday, another director, another crew, and another cast can do them justice.

RELEASED IN 1989 and directed by Michael Lehmann, “Heathers” stars Winona Ryder as Veronica, a high school student in Ohio who has sold herself out to join the popular clique of three girls, all coincidently named Heather (Kim Walker, Lisanne Falk & Shannen Doherty). The more she spends time with them, however, the more she discovers she can’t stand them. Enter mysterious new kid, JD (Christian Slater), who has a macabre solution to Veronica’s conundrum.

This is an oddball teen movie that tries to be edgy and amusing with its black humor and overt cussing. Future movies were influenced by it, like “Jawbreaker” (1999) and maybe even “Mean Girls” (2004). The commentary on peer pressure, teen suicide and the maiming destructiveness of cliques is potent. Teens can be misled by the “popular” students, yes, but they can also be misled by the outcasts.

Slater stands out as a sorta dark Fonz of the late 80s, easily one of his best roles ever. Ryder is surprisingly good as the protagonist. I say “surprisingly” because I was never big on her (although I didn’t dislike her either). The first act is quite good, but the story gets humdrum in the middle; thankfully, the last 20 minutes perk up. The late 80’s ambiance is to die for.

I’m not going to give it away, but the original ending was way more morbid. They had an alternative ending that they didn’t go with either. Apparently the studio pressured the writer/director to go with the theatrical ending, which I approve. It’s a story of redemption. Being misled by corrupt people for a season doesn’t define a person forever.

THE MOVIE RUNS 1 hours & 43 minutes and was shot in Los Angeles (the high school) and surrounding area (Santa Monica, Tujunga and Pasadena). WRITER: Daniel Waters.

GRADE: B-/C+

This movie is a high school satire done absolutely amazingly. It's everything current high school dramas wish they were. It's dark, funny, but does not lose any of its meaning to stupid jokes. It perfectly shows the hell that is high school (and society as a whole). Just like in high school, there are Marthas and Heathers everywhere in life.

J.D. is a great villain, because even though from his very introduction, we know he's a messed up person who does bad things, yet you start to empathize with him just like Veronica. It shows that, as a society, we go to great lengths to defend white men and their actions.

Heathers is furthermore also obviously a critique on the social hierarchies that exist in the world. It shows this on a smaller scale, high school. As J.D. nicely sums up towards the end of the movie: ".. because high school IS society". The Heathers rule the school and this movie really shows as to why that is. It's a system, that puts certain people at the top, like Heathers, and other _Martha's_ at the bottom. Murdering Heather Chandler might seem like a way to disrupt this hierarchy, and restore society to a pure form, but that is not the case. Heather Chandler does not equal her power, that's just a role she filled in the bigger system around them. Her being gone doesn't remove that role, it just passes it on to the next best fit.

In this movie, colors play a significant role. Heather Chandler being red represents anger and her dominance. Heather McNamara being yellow represents her kind soul, but also her weakness. Heather Duke's green represents her jealousy of Chandler. Veronica's signature color is blue which represents intelligence, but after having murdered Heather Chandler she wears a purple outfit. As you may know, blue and red make purple. I see this as Heather Chandlers 'evilness' affecting Veronica as well. Veronica might think she's rid the world of evil, yet she's simply become evil herself.