Welcome to the Dollhouse

Rating:
Summary: I LOVE this movie!!!
Review: I am going to watch for more Todd Solondz films. I don't know if WTTD has three acts and an arc, but it held me. I suppose for us late bloomers, male or female, those not physically beautiful or at least with acceptable personas, seventh grade can break your heart. If there is weakness in Solondz's film, it's the relentless humiliation and tension. Yes, there is a knowing laugh here and there, but the pain comes right back. Dawn is not yet a woman; however, she grasps at any straw that comes her way even if it means rape or violence with a local teen punk. She courageously loves her brother's friend, the unattainable teen rock and roller, but he wants no part of her youth and gawky looks.

These disappointments, her unloving mother and father, indifferent brother, and her babied younger sister are as much an impediment to her happiness as the taunting kids at school. She acts out. She's mean to younger kids, rejects her only friend, defies her mother, destroys her sister's dolls, call's her brother names, contemplates seriously murdering her sister with a hammer, and finally allows sis to be kidnapped by a nutty neighbor.

Is this all over the top? Not really! Seemed like this was the way middle school was, a nightmare of displacement where violence and perversion lurked nearby.


Rating:
Summary: Drop Dead Lesbo..
Review: This movie takes a painstakingly real look at the life of the geeky, introverted Dawn Weiner (Heather Matarazzo), that hits a little too close to home for some of us. Dawn, "Weinerdog" is in Junior High and has no friends. Everyone picks on her and treats her like most kids do in school. Dawn is in love with her older nerdy brothers "friend" Steve Rodgers who is in High School. She hates her little sister Missy, who is doted upon by her mother and pretty much a spoiled brat who's the only child that gets her parents love. Dawn has only one friend Ralphie who is younger than she is. Dawn so desperateley wants to be cool she even has a shoddy little clubhouse named "The Special People Club" in her backyard. Though Dawn is quiet and reserved, it's blatantly obvious that she's screaming for attention and acceptance in every way throughout the film, but everyone seems so cold, and ununderstanding. Whether it's dealing with the school bullies or her seemingly uncaring parents at home, we follow Dawn through her struggles of growing up as a Junior High loser. Does our anti-hero win in the movie? What do you think? It's a movie imitating life, sad as it may be, it's true.

Rating:
Summary: another uncomfortable masterpiece from Solondz...
Review: Well one thing is sure, Solondz will never be accused of making pandering, tear-jerking feel-good flicks---he seems to go out of his way to create the most uncomfortable, difficult to watch and painfully true to life films in contemporary American cinema.

"Welcome to the Dollhouse" could just as easily be titled "A 12-Year Old's Eternity in Hell." Set in a New Jersey suburb and its equally soul-killing junior high school, it's a mix of Byron's hostile universe and Kafka's vision of a world so absurdly and inexplicably cruel as to be both surreal and comic.

Hapless Dawn Wiener, who is routinely tormented by classmates not only for her name but her homely looks, glasses and clothing among other things, also has to come home to a classic dysfunctional middle class family whose parents dote on her younger sister and her older Bill-Gates-lookalike brother who's obsessed with getting into a good college. The slings and arrows come from all directions and at all times, though there is a surprising romantic development between Dawn and one of her schoolyard tormentors.

Like almost all of Solondz's work, there are no clear cut good and bad characters here, just REAL characters---all of them to a greater or lesser degree are self-absorbed freaks and none of them are blameless or innocent. In short, if you are the kind of viewer who HAS to find a "good" character to latch on to and identify with in order to watch a film, you will probably hate this film.

It abounds with humor so black and sharp and merciless you don't know whether to cry or laugh. I was able to squirm my way through the movie only by constantly looking away from the screen and reminding myself, "this is only a movie, this is not real, this is not real." Solondz's genius is such that I could only half-believe what I was saying.

So, have a stiff drink before you watch---or two or three of them!

Rating:
Summary: Disturbing but funny, even it makes you feel guilty
Review: Welcome to the Dollhouse is a lot like the recent Napoleon Dynamite. Both have the cast decked out in hideous wardrobes with horrid 1970's-looking environments. Both are about high-school oddballs who face torment from the shallow popular kids. But while Napoleon Dynamite is rather light-hearted, WTTD is really dark and will make you cringe with guilt and quite often make you feel really uncomfortable. In fact, it has more in common with a true horror movie than it does a dark comedy.

Heather Matarazzazzazzo plays the unfortunately surnamed Dawn Weiner, a girl blessed with strange looks (meh-I like her) and an uncaring ignorant family. E-ver-y-one around her is UN-BEE-LEEV-ABLY cruel to her in every way possible. And rage unconfronted continues forever. As are her bullies bullied themselves, Dawn goes on to bully others etc. It subtle idiosyncrasies like this that might go unnoticed in single viewings.

Other characters are quite well drawn, especially Brandon, who didn't get enough screen time. His relationship with Dawn is quite intriguing. Most would think he's using her as a way of making himself feel better but when you think about it that's probably not entirely true. Perhaps Brandon likes Dawn because she isn't nasty to him like Cookie and the other girls were. She wasn't tarting all over him like Lolita in the library and she stood up to Brandon for punching Troy. Also Brandon apologises to her for vandalising her locker and the sad looks he gives her in the library appear to be a look of longing and wanting.

Ironically, the biggest monster in the film is Dawn's own mother. She's a beast of a woman, completely ignorant of Dawn's needs and infatuated with her other younger daughter and far too supportive of her arrogant older brother (his character is further developed in Todd Solondz's 2004 movie Palindromes, played by the same actor). Any scene with her will make you grit your teeth and shake your head no doubt.

Too bad Heather Matarazzazzazzo is married (err...to another woman-sigh...no chance for me now) cause she's actually quite attractive in real life. Though I must say again her wardrobe in this film is 'EEK' Seriously, you'll be questioning Dawn's fashion sense. But then she's probably only wearing what her mother buys for her and wants her to be seen in.

If this movie impresses you then I dare you to check out Todd Solondz's follow-up Happiness. Now THERE is a film to dark and so unbelievably horrifying you'll be watching it through the gaps between your fingers and biting your lip in an effort to restrain the guilty laughter. But on it's own, WTTD is a great movie. Just don't show it to kids if your not down with frank portrayal of teen sexuality or bad language. Or do show them as a lesson in how NOT to treat people.

The DVD is in 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen with Dolby 2.0 sound. The print is a little beat up with track lines and speckles but it doesn't distract too much. There are no extras but I don't care.

Rating:
Summary: Point of no return.
Review: This movie is naked truth. It is extremely frank in the ways it depicts school bullying.
If school wasn't your fondest memory, this movie will recall the events for you with painful, astounding detail.

Where this movie fails, however, is entertainment value.
If it was a pseudo-documentary, I could understand.
But its a movie. It is not entertaining to watch in the least.
There is no resolution. There's no sympathy for the main character.
Despite being a "total victim", she doesn't have any redeeming qualities.
Occasionally music plays to signify that she's about to snap and do something drastic, but nothing happens - just like in real life.

But if I wanted to see real-life I'd become a schoolteacher.
This movie fails miserably to provide any sort of semblance of entertainment.
It doesn't make you think. It simply serves to vividly recall the fact that school is hell.
In the end, I have to give it one star.
I wish I didn't waste money on this film.

Rating:
Summary: Realistic Look On One Loser's Life
Review: Welcome To The Dollhouse is not what it is all about. Picking up the box at Blockbuster, I thought it was about a dollhouse. But further and further into the movie, you find out the name of her brother's band's song is Welcome To The Dollhouse. It is really about a young girl dealing with bullies, rape, and trying to be cool in a junior high. This movie does have some cussing, but it all clears up and it becomes a great movie.

Rating:
Summary: Welcome to Your Horrible Past.
Review: _Welcome to the Dollhouse_ is a depressing look into the life of a junior high school student that will bring back haunting memories for everyone having attended. In this film, director Todd Solondz stacks the deck against Dawn Wiener (the perfect last name) and starts to peel away the skin of all the characters in the film. This process of discovery, excruciatingly honest at times, feels like sandpaper chafing your entire body. Throughout the story we experience the Romantic life of an unloved girl, placed at odds against the entire world around her. Her desperate search exposes the need and lack of love in all of these character's lives, while at the same time providing an entertaining ride.

_Welcome to the Dollhouse_ rollercoasters back and forth between very different genres and it becomes hard to classify and digest. At times, I was shocked and absolutely appauled/depressed by the horrible circumstances that surrounded Dawn (played wonderfully by Heather Matarazzo); the next minute, however, you cannot stop laughing at the horrendously awkwardness of life's situations. In particular, the callous treatment Dawn receives at the hand of her family is so awful (and, yet, so honest to real life) that everyone watching the film was in tears at several points. In fact, that is a good trademark of the film: it contains, between its touching characters and shocking honesty, the ability to evoke tears of sympathy as well as humor.

While you may not wish to sit through _Welcome to the Dollhouse_ more than once due to its rigid and coarse depiction of our past, it is a wonderful film that ranks well above most of the films I see these days. Get this film. You won't be disappointed.


Rating:
Summary: Not Great......
Review: This movie was depressing but i mean if you are emotionally hurt by this movie you probably have many problems of your own and shouldnt be leaving your house. But on the other side of the arguement that this movie is great.... It is a pointless stringing together of little problems teens have as they are growing up. We were all teens right? These are things we have all lived through. We dont need to see things that we ourselves lived through just to say "hey my mom did that" or "hey i remember that when i did that" This movie is just showing us things we have ourselves lived through.

Rating:
Summary: Good film
Review: This is one of the most disturbing and off-kilter films I've seen in a while. But it's absolutely on the mark about how brutal and utterly awkward junior high can be.

Dawn Wiener (played wonderfully by Heather Matarazzo) is incessantly bullied by her classmates and all but ignored at home. Dawn is a nerd, but she is kind, observant, and makes more intelligent remarks than the rest of the cast put together. That doesn't stop Mom from blaming her for everything and taking perfect little sister Missy's side at every available opportunity. And it certainly doesn't stop her classmates from writing "Weiner Dog" all over Dawn's locker. In the end, there isn't much closure, only the realization that this period in her life won't last forever.

Todd Solondz deftly explores the horrors of being an awkward teenager, and he also delves into the mindset of suburbia. I recommend this one, but in the end thought his "Happiness" was a better film.