source: Assassination of a High School President

ASSASSINATION OF A HIGH SCHOOL PRESIDENT is a big step above most of the teen movies that focus on potty mouth dialogue and absurd situations just to get laughs. Writers Tim Calpin and Kevin Jakubowski have come up with a script that is sometimes smart but ultimately full of holes in deciding where it wants to take the original premise of this high school movie. Director Brett Simon seems to sort of let the movie flow as it develops, preventing a tight telling of a story with potential. Bobby Funke (Reece Thompson, a promising new talent) is a nerdy newspaper reporter who is never able to finish a story. Student Body President/basketball star/ladies' man Paul Moore (Patrick Taylor) seems to have everything Bobby wants, including the attention of the school's most beautiful girl Francesca (Mischa Barton). As fortune would have it a crime happens - the SATs are stolen from the office of Principal Kirkpatrick (Bruce Willis playing Bruce Willis) and Booby is on the investigation and story, a story that points to Paul as the perpetrator. Bobby's nerdiness is transformed by his attention and by the affections of Francesca, and soon the school collapses under the cloud of the crime. It is how the 'crime' is inspected and resolved that ends the film. For Bobby Funke it is a matter of 'What price glory'. The cast is fresh and it is a pleasure to see some new faces with promise. Whether it is the director's or the sound mixer's fault, much of the dialogue is swallowed by the soundtrack, a problem thankfully solved by turning on the subtitles. This is a movie with promise from all involved and it will be interesting to see if it has an impact on teen flick quality. Grady Harp

Like some critics are saying, this movie is similar to "Brick". But the thing is there can only be a certain amounts of different genres, types and styles of films. So for a detective story to happen in a high school setting in a over exaggerated, unrealistic, and fantasy like style is fine although it's been done before. I mean there is tons of movies for a certain type of genre, but you hardly see people whining about similar styles in films and go see it anyways. So "Assassination of a High School President" is it's own film, as a matter of fact it would have worked as a fresh sequel for "Brick". Now is it better than "Brick"? I don't think so. And if I had to compare it to "Brick" this is complicated but not as intelligent, not as convoluted but also not that much in depth, less heartbreaking but comedic. Also main character in this film just isn't cool or slick as Brendan from "Brick", but that could be his charm. Sophomore newspaper reporter Bobby Funke is assigned to write a cover story on Paul, the popular class president and top athlete. After a stack of SAT tests is stolen from the office of a bada** principal Kirkpatrick(Bruce Willis) and Bruce Willis is the main reason I decided to check out this film. Funke publishes an expose that names Paul as the prime suspect and, suddenly, Bobby is the hot shot on campus. But when Paul's girlfriend who is the hottest girl in school makes a move on Bobby and even his former bullies lay off his back, Funke begins to doubt the jock's guilt and everyone else's motives. And his investigation uncovers a campus wide conspiracy that threatens to take down people in high places in school. Funke must decide to either stay as the new stud on campus or decide to tell the truth, although he is sort of forced to go with the other option. The build up was good but the ending wasn't that satisfying because it was simply far fetched, had plot holes and just wasn't that creative, but passable. 7.4/10

Review: This movie was definitely not what I was expecting. Judging by the poster, and the fact that they put Bruce Lewis in it, I thought that it was going to be actually about an assassination, but it ended up being about a boy trying to find out who nicked the answers for the test in a school. There was totally no reason for Bruce Willis to be in it and the storyline was pretty terrible. It just seemed like your usual American teenage college movie, which we have seen loads of times before, and it just seemed to drag. I was quite disappointed with the film and I can totally understand why it didn't make much noise, even if Bruce Willis was in it. Expected Better! Round-Up: With the murders happening in the schools, I can totally understand why they held this movie back because I don't think that it would have gone down well with the victims relatives. The director didn't really use Bruce Willis that much so it's obvious that he plastered him all over the poster, hoping to get people to see it, but judging by the money that it took, that didn't really work. The main character who is doing all of the investigating was a bit dull and I couldn't understand why he was left to solve the problem when an adult should have dealt with the matter. Budget: $11.5million (Bruce's Wage!) Worldwide Gross : $70,000 (Terrible!) I recommend this movie to people who like there typical American teenage movies about college life. 2/10

I haven't seen Chinatown, which many are comparing this film to, but I have seen the dreadful Brick, so I'll confine this review to a comparison between this and that. Brick was incredibly dull, dull, dull. Assassination of a High School President is anything but dull. OK, it's not the Matrix, but things move along at a reasonable pace, and you're never reaching for the fast-forward. Brick was completely unbelievable. And so is Assassination of a High School President. But what makes this film better is that it doesn't take itself so seriously. Make no mistake though... the script and cinematography are very precise. It's just that this film isn't pretending to be anything more than an excellent comedy, and that allows the suspension of disbelief, for the film noir aspect to work. That's really all you need to know. If you want to see something pretentious and faux-arty, see Brick (which is one of only nine films out of 2600 that I've ever rated 1). If you want to see a smart comedy, see Assassination of a High School President.

High School. Four of the most important years of your life. But it isn't always dances and keg parties and sucking face in your parents' mini-van. Sometimes it's ugly and hard and complicated. As complicated as a conspiracy to overthrow the president. There's something rotten at St. Donovan's High and sophomore newspaper reporter Bobby Funke is on it like pink rubber bands on your little sister's braces. When senior hottie Francesca Facchini solicits Funke's help tracking down a set of stolen SATs, Funke uncovers a story dirtier than the lunch lady's mustache. After he fingers the school president (figuratively) for the crime, Funke becomes one of the most popular kids at St. Donovan's High. No longer known simply as the freshman who was once tied to a giant snowman *, Funke wins the respect of everyone from the Desert-Storm-hero-turned-educator Principal Kirkpatrick to the kid that farts on him in Spanish class. When Francesca takes Funke to homecoming, even the in-school suspension delinquents turn nice and offer guidance on how to keep his boner in check during slow dances. But high school's not always what it seems. As Funke's popularity grows so do his suspicions. Did the president really steal the SATs? Or is Funke just a pawn in a conspiracy as complicated as adolescence itself? Determined to find the truth, Funke digs deeper and unearths the sordid underbelly of St. Donovan's. Student council members, college bookies, public school brats, everyone seems to play a part. Armed only with a learner's permit and the spirit of Woodward and Bernstein, Funke must crack the case before it cracks him...Assassination of a High School President is a high school noir comedy with a good performance by its lead actor, Reece Thompson but besides this performance there's not much here worth seeing. Although the film does create a mysterious and tense atmosphere, the effort to do so is constantly undermined by ridiculous jokes and ridiculous characters that basically turn the film into a parody.The story unveils nicely but at the same time, it's not that interesting and it's definitely not original.Bruce Willis who plays the Principal, overacts during his entire screen time and fails miserably at being the comic relief and Misha Barton seems to have lost all her acting-skills since leaving The O.C.. Definitely not worth seeing, but if you really want to watch a film-noir with a high school setting, watch Brick(2005),a much more interesting, and better written film. 5.5/10

I was encouraged to watch this as it is classified as comedy here on IMDb. And I'm in love with Comedy movies. So I got the movie and watched it and for my disappointment I closed it from the half of the movie. I didn't find any comedy in the movie nor any action. I really regretted watching this movie as it was very boring, I could hardly complete it again after closing it twice in the middle. The story is not that cool, it is not hilarious as some members reviewed it and it is not so interesting. I recommend not wasting your time watching this movie and I don't know how it got more than 6 rating stars.

**SPOILER ALERT** Having made a big splash at the 2008 Sundance Film Festivle the movie "Assasination of a High School President" was slated to be released in the late winter or early spring of 2009. Only to be put on the back burner when the company that made in went bankrupt. Now available on DVD we can finally see what the big fuss was all about. School newspaperman Bobby Funke, Reece Thompson, was the butt off all jokes by the students at St. Donovan High until he broke the story to who broke into Principal Kirkpatrick's, Bruce Willis, office and stole all the SAT tests. As it turned out the culprit was non other then St. Donovan's star basketball player and student president Paul Moore, Patrick Taylor. Overnight Bobby became the most popular kid in school with even the hottest and brightest girl at St, Donovan, Paul Moore's former girlfriend, Francesca Fachini, Mischa Barton, dying to get Bobby to jump into the sack-or bathtub-with her! As Bobby was basking in his new fond popularity he started to have doubts about Paul's guilt. Everything about Paul risking everything in stealing the SAT tests just didn't make any sense to him. It seemed to Bobby that Paul was either blackmailed or tricked into committing that dastardly crime by someone who knew about his dark past. When Paul threw a number of basketball games by shaving points for reasons known only to himself and the bookie he threw the games for Freddy Bismark, Adam Pally. As Bobby started to investigate farther his worst suspicions became realities. Even worse Bobby also discovered that he himself was being set up as a pasty by those who framed Paul to take the fall for them if the truth was ever to come out! ***SPOILERS***Nice detective work on Bobby's part has him break the case of the stolen SAT tests but almost at the cost of his life. The stolen SAT's was really a diversionary action by those who set Paul up in a much bigger crime that they were in the process of committing; Embezzling the high school student treasury as well as dealing drugs on campus! It's when Bobby's life was on the line, in him being kidnapped and threatened with being thrown out of a sixth floor window, that the roof fell in on his potential murderers!***MAJOR SPOILER***They as bright as they were never expected he would have alerted the local authorities as well as Principal Kirkpatrick to who they were what they did and where they'll be at the time he was to confront them!

High school is a perfect setting for noir but Assassination of a High School President downplays the genre to instead focus on the high school aspect of the premise. Instead of getting Bobby Funke acting like a hard boiled detective out to wade through an engrossing web of lies and deceit to solve a mystery we get a nerdy kid trying to get a summer internship and gets to fit in with the cool crowd. The failure of the film rests solely on rejecting the noir aesthetic and instead doing scenes with school dances and beer pong. Visually many of the noir staples are missing with no use of shadows, pedestrian use of lightening and no camera angles. Noir is treated as nothing more than a plot device. Without high stakes it is quite hard to really become engrossed with the plot. Hanging in the balance is a summer internship that Bobby never seems to really care too much about and as a result it is hard to get worked up about the plot. Reece Thompson does a decent job as Bobby Funke, any problems with the character are issues with the writing and not with the performance. There is a huge cast of characters and honestly most serve no purpose but to further the plot. There is no depth and doesn't even make very good use of high school stereotypes. The one that missed the mark the most is the principal played by Bruce Willis. He exists as the authority figure but is way over the top and is a one note joke as an ex-soldier who is overly aggressive and keeps taking about his fighting experiences. The less said about Mischa Barton's weak attempt to play a femme fatale the better. A brief * scene does not excuse this performance. An interesting premise ruined by poor writing and direction. If you have any interest in this film at all seek out Brick, a film with a similar premise that succeeds in all ways where this film failed and is the far superior one for it.

I had never heard of this movie and found it laying around in one of my friends large DVD collections. After reading the back I thought I would hate it. I don't know why I torture myself watching movies that I think are going to make me cry to the gods to stop people from making these horrible artsy films, but I do. It seemed like a low budget stylized sort of art film that managed to pull in some mid level stars and in aging one in Bruce Willis. Not my kind of film. I was wrong!(apparently ignoring my gut turns out to be a good idea, but usually it's still torture) This was really a fun quirky, little movie that I actually enjoyed. The story is fairly sophomoric. A high school cheating scandal that the student newspaper, and the grizzled old war veteran Principal (Bruce Willis) are trying to get to the bottom of. The acting in this one is admittedly over the top, but that is the strength of this movie. It is suppose to be over the top which provides the humor throughout. Mischa Barton plays the pretty girl, so that was no stretch, Bruce Willis's tough guy image works wonderfully for his character as well. I won't get into the whole plot/ storyline as anyone can read it above, but it was a pleasantly surprising, humorous story that I would definitely recommend. I am usually not even into this kind of movie but I really enjoyed it. It was much better than sitting through another stupid Harry Potter movie that's for sure. So if you find yourself bored with nothing to watch, pop this fun little gem in the DVD player. Its a fun one that I think is definitely underrated and worth a view. Like my reviews? Hate em? Questions? Comments? Have a DVD that you want reviewed? SHoot me an e-mail at: subliminal.lithium@gmail.com