Call it an occupational hazard. As a film reviewer, I have to see movies that make me uncomfortable. Others are downright offensive. But on rare occasions there’s a picture so vile that it leaves me feeling, at my very core, severely cheapened for having seen it. The Rules of Attraction is such a movie.
The film follows a soulless bunch of rich college kids as they destroy themselves and each other. Central to the “story” is a love triangle involving a bisexual boy, as well as an unrequited obsession that leads a girl to kill herself in graphic fashion. Alcohol and hard drugs are rampant. Pornography is commonplace. Explicit sexual encounters include casual romps, gay and lesbian activity, scenes of masturbation, oral sex and a woman being raped at a party where nude coeds cavort openly. There isn’t language strong enough to describe the depravity onscreen. (Speaking of strong language, obscenities include 120 f-words.) So why review such a no-brainer? Are teens likely to be attracted to this dreck? Sadly, yes.
The only thing worse than a perverse film about adolescent promiscuity, substance abuse and suicide is one starring high-profile actors sure to pique teens’ interest. They include Van Der Beek (Dawson’s Creek), Biel (7th Heaven), Sossamon (A Knight’s Tale), Kate Bosworth (Blue Crush), Fred Savage (The Wonder Years) and Kip Pardue (Remember the Titans). Based on a novel by Bret Easton Ellis, who wrote American Psycho, this cruel, degrading profile of lecherous losers is a miserable, depressing experience I pray I’ll forget.
