serendipity studios: Perks of Being A Wallflower (2012)

Image Source: IGN

VERDICT: Sweet, funny and heartbreaking, The Perks of Being a Wallflower is honest and full of heart, both in its sincere storytelling and its strong leads; Lerman, Watson, and Miller will charm your heart and then break it in the most beautiful way.

Sorry to be a little late in posting today, I slept for twelve much-needed hours last night and then had a crazy day afterward. I haven't had a lot of time today, honestly. But I've posted, see? :)

The Perks of Being A Wallflower is based on the best-selling book of the same name by Stephen Chbosky, who also directed the movie and penned the screenplay. It's about a lonely, introverted teenager named Charlie (Logan Lerman) who is beginning the awkward freshman transition into high school with no friends (except his English teacher, played with surprising sincerity by Paul Rudd) and a troubled past. Enter Sam and Patrick (Emma Watson, Ezra Miller), two seniors with their own checkered pasts and uncertain futures. They let Charlie into their misfit world, and Charlie experiences the underground world of high schoolers for the first time as well as the experience of true friendship. As a result, Charlie's underlying afflictions begin to resurface, and Charlie has to navigate his way through high school as his past begins to unravel.

OTHER CAST MEMBERS: Mae Whitman, Erin Wilhelmi, Kate Walsh, Dylan McDermott, Nina Dobrev, Johnny Simmons, Melanie Lynskey, Joan Cusack, Nicholas Braun. Features a small appearance from musician Landon Pigg.

My first news about The Perks of Being A Wallflower came from the announcement that Emma Watson was going to be in it. I was just beginning to wean off of my Harry Potter mania (and by mania I mean "oh my goodness last movie" craziness) when I caught wind of this movie. Naturally, I hastened to see where I could get the book. But I didn't end up reading it then. I didn't truly understand it.
A few years later I found myself buying the book at a mall in NC, where I read it over the course of two or three days. A lot had happened in those few years; my own high school experience, which heartily included heartbreak, depression and loneliness, but also some joy and some excitement. The whirlwind of emotion one experiences, if you will. I had gone through a lot of that before I read the book. After reading the book and thoroughly loving and relating to it, I eagerly awaited the movie. And I ended up seeing it twice.

The Perks of Being A Wallflower has the heart in it to become a classic.

The 90's aren't usually a time period that movies draw from, unless those movies were made in the 90's. This worked really well to make the movie feel nostalgically fresh, even though a lot of skeptics would probably say that it's just a modernization of a John Hughes movie. It is very similar to John Hughes' ideals of teenagers being more than they're passed off for and all that jazz. But this story is a slightly quieter entry in the teen genre. Mostly because its protagonist is more low-key in his demeanor. That doesn't mean, however, that the issues presented are any less serious. Chbosky did a wonderful job working the mood of this movie; there are many times where it is a comedy, where it's light-hearted, where it will just make you grin like an idiot. And just as quickly, it will shift into something dark and serious almost flawlessly, making it more of a dramatic movie. It is perfectly balanced as a dramedy. It's swollen with characterization too, which only proves that it was an author who made the movie. The characters all seem to follow the same mood scheme as well; the ability to be comic and serious interchangeably.
Charlie is no exception; Logan Lerman does a wonderful job playing a sweet and lonely guy with such trouble in his heart and mind. And when Sam and Patrick come into his life, you find that they too have their own stuff. It feels realistic in this manner, because who doesn't have some kind of burden to carry? But Chbosky doesn't let that weigh down the hopefulness of the movie's message.

My favorite part of the entire movie.
Image Source: Filmz.ru

The things that Chbosky puts in these characters' lives are more modern problems that appeal to teenagers but also twentysomethings that grew up in that time period. They are problems that have existed in the human experience for years, but Chbosky is unique in the way that they are explored. Sam deals with having a former reputation that she desperately seeks to get rid of. Patrick deals with the stifling of his homosexuality in a society that is trying to squash it in every way. Even the minor characters have things that they struggle with, and these inadvertently affect the main characters. The story is so well structured that it's hard to believe Chbosky didn't necessarily experience or witness someone experience all of these things himself.
One thing that really keeps up the intrigue of the movie is Charlie's slow but steady descent into depression and eventually some form of lost sanity, all enforced by memories peppered throughout the story. And when it is finally brought to light what he experienced at the hands of his Aunt Helen (molestation, which to be frank was not clear to me in the book. The movie was when I first figured it out), it is a little jarring. Your heart breaks for Charlie all over again, the fact that such a terrible thing happened to him through a woman he obviously revered. I actually always cry at the part when Charlie is first in the hospital, because it reminds me strongly of my first night hospitalized too, except mine was for depression and not molestation.
It is a true testament to the strength of friendship that his friends, home from college, show up at his doorstep after he is released from the hospital and take him for a drive.

Logan Lerman, Emma Watson, and Ezra Miller worked so well together.
Image Source: Flicks and Bits

Charlie and Sam's love, if I can be a hopeless romantic for a moment, is so honest and sweet. Before they share their first kiss, Sam talks about hers. Another occurrence of an unsettling transition from light to dark: "I was eleven. His name was Robert. He used to come over to the house all the time." "Was he your first boyfriend?" "He was my dad's boss." (I remember when my best friend and I saw Perks, and she literally froze in her seat at that part) Sam is vulnerable with Charlie in that scene, saying she wants his first kiss to be with someone who loves him. It's a very decent thing for her to do and completely believable of a teenager (I know because I am one); give Charlie something she never got. It's one of the most unique kiss scenes I've ever seen in a movie, and it charmed my heart.

For the record, I never once thought that Sam had any kind of resemblance to Hermione. Emma Watson deserves a fair bit of credit for that, in my opinion.
Image Source: Tumblr

I loved that the author of the book also directed the movie and wrote the script. That's part of what made it so special, for fans of the book especially and also for writers like myself. Imagine that, bringing your own story to life on the big screen? Where were you when your book became a movie, Kathryn Lasky? (Guardians of Ga'Hoole was a terrible movie, as I will express in a later post. But I digress)

Personally, I thought the movie has sort of been underrated in terms of awards. It deserves more than its gotten.
Image Source: theartsdesk

It's incredibly sincere and honest in a way that is sometimes uncomfortable. It's easy, especially for people who are my age or around there, to identify with this lovely little oddball of a story. You will fall in love with the characters, and they will break your heart and then fill it with hope. I highly recommend you read the book, either before or after you see the movie. I have a strong feeling you'll enjoy it either way.

GRADE: A

RATING: PG-13 for for mature thematic material, drug and alcohol use, sexual content including references, and a fight - all involving teens

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