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Movie Review: SLC Punk (Merendino)

I knew I could identify with the writer of SLC Punk when they had the scene of the 13 year old kids playing D&D in a basement. Sure, I was never a punk, my school didn't have the rigid segmentation of the different "tribes" and I haven't yet gone through a year of anarchy, but I think the movie touches on a lot of the ideas and questions of people growing up in high school and college. Watching it now is a little strange, because I feel reasonably confident in how I have answered a lot of those unanswerable questions, so seeing the characters struggle with them could have been difficult to watch as they do all sorts of dumb things, but there was enough to the characters (and the narrative style) that it felt like they would have the necessary revelations and find their own reasonable answers by the end of this. And the tone made me think they'd find answers that wouldn't upset me. Which is nice once in a while. Matthew Lillard did a surprisingly good job of making all the speeches without getting on my nerves too much, and was able to effectively convey the transition from unquestioning faith in an ideal to eventually realizing the impracticality of ideals. The end of the movie seemed a little too melodramatic, with a major event happening to speed up the end of the journey, which was a definite change in tone from the rest of the movie but good enough to do what it had to do. I especially liked the scene of running into a friend who was now a beggar, and the sense of awkwardness Stevo felt after turning his back, realizing he couldn't live up to his ideal but still not knowing how to deal with that. I was also surprised that his character gave up so thoroughly at the end, making a few cliched comments about fighting the system from within, but almost said in the knowing way of people who understand that they won't really do it - that goal isn't the top priority anymore. And I can understand that feeling a little too well, even if I didn't go through that much of a rebellion phase. So, don't expect anything too profound from this movie, but it was a nice reflection of a lot of the issues that most "teen movies" don't get at in any meaningful way.

If someone can explain to me how a Van Halen song got a place on the soundtrack, though, I'd like to know. That's a little over the top even for a "it's not punk, which makes it even more punk" statement.