Crush

MUCH TO LIKE....With a flaw (or too many desserts!)
I really loved a great deal about this movie and I still think it's very worthwhile. However, there is a flaw that prevented it from becoming a small cult classic. They try way too hard to keep the audience off balance. I never thought I would call that a flaw. This is a very rare instance where they should have kept the plot slightly more derivative and stuck with the formula. I won't give spoilers. I just kept thinking through the first half of the movie how much better it seemed than impressions I formed from reviews. A certain moment arrives in the movie and it simply changes the atmosphere, not because it was implausible, but because it simply tried too hard. It was like when I made this girl I liked in college two cheesecakes for her birthday because I couldn't decide which one was the best. I was completely genuine, the cheesecakes were awesome, but you can guess the effect.

With that out of the way, I want to say how much this movie really had going for it...

YOU KISSED THE WRONG GIRL
The film centers around Bess (Crystal Reed) and her crush on Scott (Lucas Till). Bess is the socially awkward new kid. She seemingly lives alone in a house while working at a book store. Scott has looks, brains, and athletic ability. All the girls drool over him. Jules (Sarah Bolger) is his girlfriend who he breaks up with because he needs to concentrate. (Seriously, can you believe a guy wrote this?)

Other people include teammate Casey (Preston Davis) who believes Scott is a ball hog. Scott's dad is protective and is always going out to work. And Jeffrey (Reid Ewing) has a crush on Bess. Their relationship is encouraged by an older woman and confidant (Meredith Salenger) who works at the bookshop.

Accidents happen to people around Scott. We get to see the arm or hand of the person who is revealed to us about an hour into the film when our fairly decent mystery turns into "Misery."

I couldn't help think that the song "Love Stinks" would have made a...

Where Death Strikes with Shocking Suddenness
You know it's coming - but when homicide hits in this movie, it comes with the speed of a rattlesnake strike. It's swifter than the eye can capture, and it's more sinister than any thuggish attack could ever be.

After a shocker of an opening sequence, the movie proceeds at a slower pace for a while. We see the very socially awkward and involute Bess yearning after the handsome jock in her school. The tension builds as we wonder how far her obsession has taken her in the past and is taking her in the present. Almost everyone is suspect though.

This is a good effort at a psychological thriller. The protagonists really talk with each other - or at least exchange more telling texts. So we get to know them better than we do in the average thriller that's being cranked out. Their motivations aren't always very clear or consistent, and the writers perhaps did some reaching for a different, interesting resolution. But I think you'll find this movie worth your time...

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