The Quiet Review
by news.west.earthlink.net (Steve DOT Rhodes AT InternetReviews DOT com)August 24th, 2006
THE QUIET
A film review by Steve Rhodes
Copyright 2006 Steve Rhodes
RATING (0 TO ****): **
THE QUIET cries out for an easy three word review - needs more sleaze. THE QUIET is the second cheerleader movie from director Jamie Babbit. Her first one, BUT I'M A CHEERLEADER, was happily and unabashedly campy. Her latest, however, is a slow and plodding thriller that only comes alive when it moves into guilty pleasure territory, which doesn't happen very often.
THE QUIET's good cast is trapped in a clunky script from Abdi Nazemian and Mica Schraft, which relies heavily on an ever-present and awkward narration. Dot (Camilla Belle, THE BALLAD OF JACK AND ROSE), is a seventeen-year-old girl who claims to have been suddenly struck deaf when her mother died, which was when Dot was just seven. Until recently Dot has lived with her father. After her father is killed in an accident, Dot goes to live with Nina (Elisha Cuthbert, THE GIRL NEXT DOOR), a sarcastic cheerleader, and Nina's mother and daddy, played by Edie Falco and Martin Donovan.
The movie has two intersecting storylines. In one, Nina both flirts with her daddy and fights him off. Her friends think she is a virgin, but she has had lots of sex, all incestuous. Of course, she plans on killing dear old dad.
In the other and more pretentious and ridiculous storyline, we meet Dot, a girl who claims to be unable to speak or hear but who appears very aware of everything going on around her. Trapped in the aforementioned awful script, Belle is forced to express herself through a limited range of facial expressions. In the overwrought and pretentious narration, Dot goes on and on about how Beethoven dealt with deafness.
The story is a constant tease, showing little and talking a lot. Nina and her friends at school are obsessed with discussing sex. At one of Nina's many sleepovers with Michelle (Katy Mixon), Michelle wonders how a girl can tell whether she is a good kisser or not. She says that probably the way to know would be to kiss a friend who would tell her the truth. As they lie next to each other in their underwear, you fully expect Michelle to reach over and plant a juicy one on Nina in this R-rated film, but it never happens. Another time, Nina tells Michelle to stop exposing her breast, but only Nina sees it, not the audience.
The movie has tonal problems throughout. The cinematography with great moody lighting suggests a serious thriller, but the dialog and the plot could only work in the context of a campy comedy.
The movie has real trouble ever ending. Trying on one conclusion after another like teens trying on clothes at the mall, it finally finds one that fits, albeit just barely.
THE QUIET runs 1:31. It is rated R for "strong and disturbing sexual content, a scene of violence, language, drug content and brief nudity" and would be acceptable for older teenagers.
The film opens nationwide in the United States on Friday, September 1, 2006. In the Silicon Valley, it will be showing at the AMC theaters, the Century theaters and the Camera Cinemas.
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