Old Stuff
Disturbing Behavior (1998)
Directed by David Nutter
This teenage version of the "Stepford Wives" has almost nothing going for it except for "Dawson's Creek's" Katie Holmes in various biffy shirts. Though, she's got a rockin' little bod that's shown off in lingering close ups while she slouches and pouts, trying her best to look alienated, it would've been nice to have given her something to do. Here's another teenage flick where a torrid wench has the mandatory piercings and "paint" to prove how alternative she is, a visual short hand to let us know she is "deep". Things are at a point where a scream queen with no piercings or tattoos would be downright kinky.
Anyway, the story is about Steve (James Marden) who is a troubled teen... ah, is there any other kind? Also, he's troubled but he isn't trouble... who has just moved to Turtle Cove (or wherever) and starts to notice that something is horribly amiss. It seems that all the neighborhood's rebellious youths become transformed overnight into throwbacks from a "Father Knows Best" episode.
However, they aren't completely good little boys and girls. They fly into murderous rages anytime they have a sexual impulse, which makes it somewhat surprising that this flick doesn't have a higher body count. The problem with this flick is that the children's parents are so far in the background that their motivations for lobotomizing their kids is completely mysterious. After all, the kiddies seem to be suffering from nothing more that run-of-the-mill teenage angst. Why go to such extreme measures to reign them in? What's the panic?
One of the movie's most memorable scenes is where a young lady from the "blue ribbon" group comes over to seduce Marsden. As she kisses him, her eyes begin to glow red and we know extreme violence won't be far behind. At that moment, Marsden pushes her away, I guess to move the story forward. When she catches sight of herself in the mirror, with her breasts exposed and all sweaty, she starts bugging. She repeats over and over, "bad... wrong... bad... wrong", before thrusting her knoggin into the hallway mirror. Interestingly, Marsden doesn't inform her that she wasn't doing anything bad or wrong, except for the part of breaking her face on a piece of his parent's funiture. Stunned, he watches in disbelief as she gathers herself and informs him, "I have to go home. I have an important physics test tomorrow!" I wish I had a penny for every time this has happened to me.
The antagonist is also unmotivated. He's the school's psychiatrist who's trying to perfect happy teenagers, ignoring the fact that if he's successful he would be putting himself out of a job. At this point a character who comes out of nowhere, the school's mentally challenged janitor. It's revealed that he's actually smart because he reads Kurt Vonnegut novels. You know, if that were true, then I guess it would mean that your humble reviewer is really smart, too. The truth is that I like reading Kurt Vonnegut and I'm also a foaming at the mouth retard!
Though "Disturbing Behavior" has a gimmick, it didn't bother with what Roger Corman use to call, "the slight social message". While the "Stepford Wives" was a real timepiece about the woman's liberation movement and men's anxiety about it, where's the social undercurrent at work in "Disturbing Behavior"? Maybe, if the kids had been much badder, sorta like a cross between "Stepford Wives" and "A Clockwork Orange", then you would have something. The question would become, "If you could take really troubled kids and make them 'perfect' (at the expense of their personalities and free will) would you do it? Should you destroy the individual and all their potential for good and evil for a predictable behavior? A better idea would have been to ditch the teen angle altogether and do a reversal of the "Stepford Wives". Make the "Stepford Husbands" where sloppy, coach potatoes are transformed by their wives into fantastic shopping buddies! Talk about a story whose time has come. -- Rating: $1.16 ($1.00 for the scene pictured above - $0.16 for the rest!)
Tom Graney -- copyright 1998 Hollywood Outsider