Olivia Wilde

“Booksmart” also cuts its manic horniness with a meandering weirdness that recalls Richard Linklater’s ambling “Dazed and Confused” as well as hints of the low-key dread running through “American Graffiti,” the urtext of this genre.

Because of the film’s timeless message, Booksmart evokes the pantheon of teen/college comedies that come to define generations: Fast Times at Ridgemont High, The Breakfast Club, Dazed and Confused, 10 Things I Hate About You, and, yes, even Superbad.

We’ve had movies like “Dazed and Confused,” “Mean Girls,” and “Breakfast Club,” and we’re very fortunate to have had two very good movies (“Eighth Grade”) about the modern youth culture in the last five years.

The pendulum of teen girl movies swings typically from Clueless—girl-powered, cutesy, high-fashion first-love-centered—to Thirteen, the wild, angry, depressed and running from all genuine emotion kind of movie.

Recall the moronic brio of cosseted sixteen-year-old Beverly Hills resident Cher Horowitz, who pronounces “Haitians” as “Hate-ee-ans” during debate class, in Amy Heckerling’s Clueless (1995), or the title character in Greta Gerwig’s Lady Bird (2017), a Sacramento native who disdainfully announces to her mother that she wants to apply to colleges on the East Coast, “where culture is.”

It borrows its it-all-happened-during-one-night time frame from “American Graffiti” and “Dazed and Confused,” some soundtrack concepts from “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” and one of the lead characters is more than a little bit related to Cher from “Clueless.”

“Booksmart” also cuts its manic horniness with a meandering weirdness that recalls Richard Linklater’s ambling “Dazed and Confused” as well as hints of the low-key dread running through “American Graffiti,” the urtext of this genre.

It borrows its it-all-happened-during-one-night time frame from “American Graffiti” and “Dazed and Confused,” some soundtrack concepts from “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” and one of the lead characters is more than a little bit related to Cher from “Clueless.”

The high school coming-of-age comedy is a subgenre unto itself, with each decade delivering movies that have become classics, like American Graffiti, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Can't Hardly Wait, Superbad, Easy A and more recent films such as The Edge of Seventeen and Lady Bird.

People may think that the amalgamation of ideas and ripped-off concepts from films and their respective directors (primarily Bryan Forbes’ “The Stepford Wives,” which Jordan Peele borrowed elements of for his directorial debut, “Get Out”) might be the problem that breaks the entire film into multiple pieces.

Following up her 2019 directorial debut, Booksmart, with what ostensibly looks like a remake of The Stepford Wives (1975), would be a huge gamble, were Olivia Wilde not up to the challenge.

Por um lado, é a reprodução de “The Stepford Wives” de Bryan Forbes (1975) mais uma vez, a reutilização do modelo de quotidiano americano dos anos 50, onde os conservadorismos patriarcais de mão dada com o capitalismo serviam como resposta agressiva aos movimentos sufragistas que por aí se manifestavam.

Back in the days of “Porky’s,” “Losin’ It,” and “Zapped!,” we used to call these things “stu-coms,” short for “stupid,” and the good ones (“Better Off Dead,” “Risky Business”) were few and far between.

Certain elements are reminiscent of high school movies ranging from “Risky Business” to “Fast Times at Ridgemont High” to “The Breakfast Club” to “Say Anything” to “Superbad” to “Easy A,” and “Booksmart” often presents familiar characters and situations: the gigantic blow-out party, the last chance to reveal one’s true feelings to a longtime crush, well-meaning but clueless parents, the misunderstood “weirdo” kid, the big fight between best friends, etc.

Con los inspiradores precedentes de John Hugues de los años 80 y la derivación paródica de American Pie (Paul Weitz, 1999), alcanzaría un cierto cénit en la cinefilia joven con Supersalidos (Greg Mottola, 2007), la historia de dos alumnos de instituto bastante pringados que deciden contra toda expectativa y esperanza organizar un fiestón.

Its setup may seem rote – the sort of hook we’ve seen in so many of these movies, whether it’s “Can’t Hardly Wait,” “American Pie” or “Superbad” – but “Booksmart” takes that tired premise and makes it something entirely its own.

Wilde’s smart directing choices and the bravery of her two fearless leads transform a series of comic set-pieces, usually seen in fare such as American Pie, into iconic character moments.

Don’t Worry Darling draws parallels to The Stepford Wives , The Truman Show , The Matrix , The Village , Inception , Antebellum , WandaVision , and virtually every episode of The Twilight Zone .

En No te Preocupes, Cariño colisionan un paupérrimo guión de Katie Silberman, en base a una historia de Carey Van Dyke y Shane Van Dyke, con una dirección aceptable de parte de Olivia Wilde, que si bien le agrega tensión, vertiginosidad, suspenso y profundidad estética a una trama llena de puntos muertos y cabos sueltos, también arrastra malas decisiones y adolece de un final pobre, el cual intenta recuperar infructuosamente lo mejor de The Truman Show (1998), de Peter Weir, The Matrix (1999), de los hermanos Wachowski, e Inception (2010), de Christopher Nolan, pero termina copiando sin demasiado éxito ni disimulo a The Village (2004), de M. Night Shyamalan, y sobre todo The Stephford Wives (1975), la película de Bryan Forbes con guión de William Goldman basada en la novela de Ira Levin de principios de la década del setenta, que tuvo una pobre remake en 2004 dirigida por Frank Oz.

Certain elements are reminiscent of high school movies ranging from “Risky Business” to “Fast Times at Ridgemont High” to “The Breakfast Club” to “Say Anything” to “Superbad” to “Easy A,” and “Booksmart” often presents familiar characters and situations: the gigantic blow-out party, the last chance to reveal one’s true feelings to a longtime crush, well-meaning but clueless parents, the misunderstood “weirdo” kid, the big fight between best friends, etc.

The alumni include John Hughes (The Breakfast Club), Amy Heckerling (Clueless), Reginald Hudlin (House Party), Richard Linklater (Dazed and Confused), Diablo Cody (Juno), Daniel Waters (Heathers), Sofia Coppola (The Bling Ring), and Cameron Crowe (Say Anything).

There was Animal House, Say Anything, Can’t Hardly Wait, and Superbad, just to name some of the most prominent examples in the genre.

Taking the form of other one-day high school-adjacent films like American Graffiti, Can’t Hardly Wait, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Dazed and Confused, and, most notably, Superbad, we follow the best friends over the next 24 hours as they set out to catch up on the fun they missed out on, packing in all the madcap adventure and graduation-induced anxiety one can imagine.

Much like Superbad , American Pie or the supremely underrated Can’t Hardly Wait , the bulk of the narrative is concerned with capturing the carefree innocence of teenagers acting up and throwing caution to the wind in those final blissful moments before their lives change dramatically.

The Gang’s All Here: Evoking Can’t Hardly Wait in the hyper-modern weirdness of its ensemble, Booksmart pads out its supporting cast with teens that, no matter how big or small their role, brim with personality.

Numerous references to other films litter the second half of the movie, especially The Stepford Wives, 1984 and even Suspiria and Thelma And Louise, but with its 1950s paranoia, it’s most reminiscent of The Invasion Of The Body Snatchers.