Spork (2010)

Very well executed

Brilliant and touching

it is finally so absorbing because it plays like a lyrical road odyssey that’s also a detective story.

A film with more than the usual spoiler issues. Talking about it in any detail feels akin to handing you a gift-wrapped present and saying, "I hope you like it -- It's a thriller about a diabolical secret experiment."

Spork (Savannah Stehlin) is a 14 year old hermaphrodite outcast. She lives with her older brother Spit in a trailer. Her best friend is black girl Tootsie Roll living in the next trailer. Chunk is a fellow outcast who tells her to be herself. Charlie has two gay father but refuses to be a fag. Spork gets bullied by the mean girls and she hits Betsy Byotch on the nose with a basketball. Betsy vows revenge. There's a school dance contest. Tootsie Roll gets injured and can't win the prize money to travel to visit her father in prison. Spork decides to enter.This is a weird and completely original movie. This is a strange alternate take on the very familiar high school genre. It's appealing and the young actors are terrific. It has a fun energy that is awkward and stumbling. If little blonde girls doing blackface is funny, then this is the movie for you.

I find these glowing and frankly quite obvious shill reviews for this absolute disaster of a film to be somewhat annoying and also telling; it's 2012 and clearly this movie sank like a stone (deservedly) with only the most bored of cineastes bothering to give it a try at three in the morning on streaming Netflix.Spork is a terrible, stupid movie which supposes that its audience has forgotten about or never seen Napoleon Dynamite. I'm not a huge fan of Dynamite, but there is at least a sweetness inherent in the absurd material that makes you smile and definitely produces a few genuine laughs from time to time. Spork is lacking in even that, and is populated with unpleasant, slutty kids acting like...unpleasant, slutty kids? Who dance like sluts at the dance-off? And then it ends? No humor to speak of, and definitely not worth your time, even if you do happen to be bored to tears.Avoid at all costs. Absolute crap.

The biggest thing that strikes home on "Spork" is it's genuine heart. Like John Hughes before it; we have kids honestly represented, speaking like adults as they process their angst. If you like great music, believable characters and you love movies like "Mean Girls," "Napoleon Dynamite" and Linklatter's classic "Dazed And Confused," you will love the touching day in the life coming-of-age story that is "Spork." The only other movie that compares to a protagonist struggling to fit in like "Spork," is the Corey Haim classic "Lucas." In fact Savannah Stehlin seems to channel him, dorky glasses included.This film is destined to be a classic. Do yourselves a favor and see this movie so you can fall in love with "Spork" and her best friend "Tootsie Roll" - a break out performance by Sydney Park. You will not be disappointed.

I was fortunate enough to catch the final midnight screening of this at the Tribeca festival 2010. I went in with a very much half-soaked approach. The idea of a sexual discovery narrative driven by a 12 year old wasn't entirely appealing to me. But, having said that, my view was instantly and irreversibly changed.Within the first ten minutes of the film, you will find yourself gripped by a cast matured far beyond their years, and intimate and precise direction that is often lacking in even the most impressive titles.I wont go into the story, or why i enjoyed this film quite so much, but suffice to say, the writing is spot on. Rather than talking down to the young cast, the script really exalts them, and you feel on an emotional par with every member of the cast.I watched a lot of films from indie festivals this year, and i can only hope that Spork gains the critical acclaim, and distribution deal that it deserves. I cant wait to see it on British shores!