Heart of America
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | Heart of America |
| Original title | Heart of America |
| Country of production | Germany / Canada |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 2003 |
| length | 89 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 16 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Uwe Boll |
| script | Uwe Boll, Robert Dean Klein |
| production | Uwe Boll, Wolfgang Herold , Philip Selkirk , James Shavik |
| music | Reinhard Besser |
| camera | Mathias Neumann |
| cut | David M. Richardson |
| occupation | |
| |
Heart of America is a German-Canadian drama directed by Uwe Boll . It was published in 2003 and deals with the history of a school massacre .
action
The film is set at Riverton High School in the USA on the last day before summer vacation. The story is told from multiple perspectives and covers some subplots with flashbacks.
Teacher
Harold Lewis, director of Riverton High School, has a serious talk with Will Prat, the creative writing teacher . The unsuccessful hobby writer had mostly badly rated the students and humiliated them in front of the class. After some persuasion, Prat now wants to make amends on the last day.
The thugs
As always, the thugs meet on the sports field. Over a joint , Frank Herman ( Will Sanderson ) talks to his little brother Ricky ( Brendan Fletcher ) about his antics when he was still at school. The thugs follow the story of how Frank and his cronies raped a disabled girl with interest . Ricky, who has meanwhile taken on the role of his brother as a school thug, starts to ponder.
Dara, Daniel and Barry
Daniel Lynne and Barry Schultz ( Michael Belyea ) have planned for the last day of school to take revenge on their classmates who tormented and bullied them for years. For this purpose they got firearms and hid them in the school. While Barry has concerns, Daniel eagerly awaits the day of his revenge. They are joined by Dara ( Elisabeth Rosen ), a junkie who is in love with the football player Paul ( Alejandro Rae ). However, this had only exploited her sexually.
More students
Paul tries to break up with his longtime girlfriend Karyn Lewis ( Stefanie MacGilivray ). This had denied him sexually and now he holds against her how often he cheated on her. The above-average intelligent student Wex Presley ( G. Michael Gray ) hires out as a drug dealer and receives a speech from the school psychologist. A couple argue about a pregnancy.
The massacre
Daniel shoots Ricky and some members of his thugs. He accidentally shoots the father-to-be. After the shots, he turns the gun on himself. Dara shoots Will Prat and her rival Karyn Lewis for humiliation. She is overwhelmed by a member of the thugs who previously mistreated Daniel, after which the thug is celebrated as a hero. Barry, who was not involved in the massacre, goes home.
The film ends with several plaques pointing to other school massacres in the United States.
background
The film is Boll's contribution to the recent school massacres, above all the acts in Littleton and Erfurt . It is the third film by Boll KG, which he founded, and was shot mainly in Canada with international cast.
criticism
In the audio commentary, Uwe Boll compares the film with Gus Van Sant's Elephant and blames it for its failure at the Cannes Film Festival in 2003 , even though, in his opinion, it delivered the better film. The vast majority of film critics did not share this self-assessment, although the film is considered one of the better Boll works. On the official website, Uwe Boll proudly refers to the film Congratulations from Ron Howard .
“Exaggerated drama (not only) geared towards everyday American school life, which tries to analyze how the smallest disruptions in school processes can lead to disasters. Trying to be serious, the film refers to the fatal events in Littleton and Erfurt in order to shed light on possible causes of school rampages. "
“From a purely cinematic point of view, 'Heart Of America' may be Uwe Boll's most bearable failure, but nevertheless it is mostly stupid and sadistic from start to finish - and that is natural for a film that absolutely wants to be perceived as a serious contribution to the Columbine massacre absolutely unbearable. "
“The film is a lot more captivating than I thought, especially since I honestly didn't expect much from a drama from Uwe Boll's pen. But he shows that he can do it: make films, I mean, and maybe you can even hope that his next films (like the 60 million dollar project In the Name of the King (2007), Far Cry (2008)) again provide some of the quality that Heart of America shows - even if they are entertainment films, which one really cannot say about them. "
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Christopher Petersen: Review on Filmstarts.de
- ↑ News message ( Memento of the original from November 20, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on the official website
- ↑ Heart Of America in the Lexicon of International Films
- ↑ LD: Review ( Memento of the original from October 19, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on Film-sprache.de
Web links
- Heart of America in the Internet Movie Database (English)