Skipped Parts (2000)

Crappy film

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama

Skipped Parts is a coming of age drama / comedy that is filmed like it is an after school special for a G rated audience. This is part of the reason why this movie lacks an audience. The subject matter is R rated, then again, there is no nudity and very little scenes of a sexual nature. Playing around with an audience (that doesn't exist) it is hard for this movie to be taken serious or funny. The movie has its moments where you wish there was more to see. Many scenes and situations are created but nothing comes from it. In the end, the movie concludes with a hidden moral. If you don't look hard enough, you are sure to miss it. The movie does not hit the audience in the head with a sledge hammer. This is a cute movie with cute characters but nothing grand or amazing. Some characters are close to perfection while others have nothing to offer their character let alone something for the audience to watch. A nice little movie, nothing more.

I thought the modern take on Romeo & Juliet in the Paul Sorvino/Lanie Kazan comedy 'Is Love All There Is' was the most ridiculous tale of young kids in love gone overboard that I had ever seen. That was, of course, until I watched Skipped Parts. Skipped Parts is the story of a 'bohemian' type of mother and son (at least by the rural Southwestern mid 60s standards) who basically turn their town's conventions upside down to a heavy degree. Lydia, a fantastic part played well by Jennifer Jason Leigh (it is a part reminiscent of her role as the punchy undercover journalist in 'The Hudsucker Proxy'), is kicked out of her North Carolina home where she lived with her overbearing, strict father in order to avoid embarrassment during his Senate campaign. Lydia is hanging by a thin string, already proved to be ill equipped to deal with responsibility. Thus, her teen son, is more of an equal, and an intelligent one to make up for the lack of parenting on Lydia's part.Together, they arrive in a small, 'proper' town in Wyoming, both hopelessly lost and terribly out of place, of course, given their nature. But this story and the two's effect on the town are more like an unfocused rebellion. That in the face of such staunch idiocy and conservatism by the town, Lydia and her son Sam (Bug Hall) are just going to to completely turn the town around, whether on purpose or by accident. With no direction, but just to rebel. The product is something even more out-of-wack than the small town was prior to their arrival, just in the opposite manner, so to speak. Sam befriends a pristine classmate, played by a very young Micha Barton. The two fourteen year olds develop more than just a 'show me yours and I'll show you mine' interest in sex. And with Lydia and her zany friend's encouragement, they do some experimenting. This is weird in the first place. Maybe not if we weren't such a sexual-conscious culture when it came to teenagers, but we are. Weird even for me. But, the two teenagers, who seem to like this experimentation, don't know when to give up, especially considering Lydia's warnings that once the girl gets her period, it's over. Well, I guess it's no surprise why this movie never hit mainstream release, or at least widespread mainstream release, considering the field day the religious right would have with this movie (and the book on which it's based?), with such young kids going for sex, and on top of everything else, a fourteen year old getting pregnant. And on top of that, keeping the baby. Meanwhile, we still see Sam as just a child. With his boyish fantasies about the movie star on screen and the like. How is it anyone thought they'd be capable of raising a child? How is it these kids thought so? The situation is taken way too lightly, and that's hard to get past.Other events in the town set off more chaos, possibly all started by the 'sex games' that Sam and his friend endure. But, that is more tolerable in mainstream American movies. The seemingly perfect wife having an affair and an abortion; the irresponsible mother being unable to commit and all of that. It's typical American fare, even in comedies. But somehow, I just can't get past how bizarre and how far things go between Sam and Maurey (Barton). It is an entirely strange, and more than not, an unbelievable situation. I think they went a little far with the intentions of showing how two 'liberated' people can have such a domino effect on such a tight-fisted town, for good or for worse.

It's 1963. Lydia Callahan (Jennifer Jason Leigh) is a single mom to 14 year old Sam (Bug Hall). She's an embarrassment to her wealthy father. He exiles them from Greensboro, North Carolina while he runs for governor. Sam has a fantasy life with dream girl (Drew Barrymore). They drive out to Wyoming to start a new life. Sam doesn't get along in school and with opinionated Maurey Pierce (Mischa Barton). He thinks he's in love. He defends her as she grieves for JFK's assassination. They decide to explore sex taking Lydia's advice. Maurey starts dating the jock who bullied him while she sets religious Chuckette Morris (Alison Pill) on him.Jennifer Jason Leigh has become an expert in the chain smoking, oversexed, white trash characters. Her performance is enough to recommend this movie. The underage sex is probably where all the negativity for the movie is coming from. The fact that the movie has this light quirky way may be even more enraging. Alison Pill is absolutely too funny as Chuckette. This is a charming and tough coming-of-age movie if one doesn't get on one's high horse.

Skipped Parts was a dark comedy, there is no doubt about that. I especially enjoyed the innuendo; it added to the feeling of guilty pleasure you get from watching a movie like this. I guess the typical Leave it to Beaver image of the 1950s in my mind created a sense of perverse pleasure while viewing the characters' twisted lives. Bug Hall's last few lines at the end of this movie summed up it's purpose: the movie is one big statement about the sexual and social paradoxes present in the society of the 1950s and, in all reality, in today's society also. While being poorly developed characters, you cannot help but root for the two kids. The religious right would go ape over this movie, if they watched anything besides The Bible Network. It raises some curious questions about the nature and structure of the family and reproductive responsibility. Overall, I would give it a 6.5 out of 10. A good waste of time, but little else.