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 Tom Tangney
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'Spring Breakers' is unsettling and oddly compelling

BY Tom Tangney  on March 22, 2013 @ 6:35 am (Updated: 1:16 pm - 3/22/13 )

A couple of Disney starlets do their best to scuff up their images in the very non-Disney film, "Spring Breakers."

Good girls gone bad: That's not only the theme of the movie "Spring Breakers," it's also the career trajectories of Disney sweethearts Vanessa Hudgens of "High School Musical" fame and Selena Gomez from "Wizards of Waverly Place."

The two young actresses play co-eds bored with college life, especially when they're stuck on campus over spring break.

They don't want to sit around another day, but they have to figure out where to get the money to on spring break.

It's a bit startling to see but these girls with a couple of their girlfriends hold up a restaurant - robbing it to pay for a spontaneous trip to Florida. Although they only used squirt guns in their crime, the exhilaration they feel is palpable.

It only primes their emotional pumps for an out of control spring break, a break full of sex and drugs and rap and guns, lots and lots of guns.

When our heroines end up in jail for drugs and alcohol, they're bailed out by the overly friendly local gangster, named Alien, played to the hilt by James Franco.

Moviegoers may be talking about Selena Gomez and Vanessa Hudgens going into the theater but it will be James Franco they'll be talking about coming out. Tricked out with cornrows and a full grill, Franco oozes one part charm to three parts sleaze. It's alternately a hilarious and scary performance.

One of the most striking scenes involves little more than Franco plunking at a white grand piano and surrounded by our bikini-clad co-eds wearing pink ski masks and toting assault weapons. And, of course, they're all singing a Britney Spears song.

The movie itself is not what you might call commercial fare. The director Harmony Korine is notorious for making bizarre, non-linear films, and "Spring Breakers," although by far his most mainstream movie, is more about mood and atmosphere than character - or titillation even.

It's unsettling and oddly compelling which happens to be a good way to describe this movie too.

Tom Tangney, KIRO Radio Host
Tom Tangney is co-host of KIRO Radio's Seattle's Morning News and resident enthusiast of...everything. He loves books, movies, TV, art, pop culture, politic, sports, and Husky football.
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Comments (9)


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  • ron prevost wrote...
    Tom - Unsettling and odd is that you think this clip worth of a post.
    March 22, 2013 5:55 am
    The Wizard of Oz, this is not. ... Although with a few more explicit clips, it could entertain our 'mommy's basement' posters on their computers for a few key strokes.
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  • CH wrote...
    there you go Flounder BLAWN
    March 22, 2013 8:20 am
    you must bee in the basement group too.
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  • clevesside wrote...
    once again Hollywood aims for the ......
    March 22, 2013 8:53 am
    ...the 15-year-old boys/men market, which is getting fewer and fewer. Small wonder the country is fallng behind in all areas, with small-minded and salacious crap like this to show the world. Negative stars all around.
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  • chubby wrote...
    Dori the Hypocrite . . .
    March 22, 2013 9:56 am
    how many times Anne Bremner drove drunk before she was finally caught. Ask her next time you have her on your show, Dori. And please, please, please start taking phone calls from listeners again. It is torture to listen to you banter with that pea brain producer, Jake. It's talk radio . . . the callers make the show!
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  • clevesside wrote...
    Name a quality Dori and Tom Tangey...
    March 22, 2013 12:02 pm
    ... have in common. I can't either, and neither can some bloggers. Blame the weather.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • Newton wrote...
    Its evil, Disney all the way!.
    March 22, 2013 12:37 pm
    Eyes wide shut movie. Girls gone bad. Nothing new.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • bruce1 wrote...
    I just saw 'Spring Breakers' today
    March 31, 2013 10:08 pm
    I totally agree with your take on it TT. James Franco deserves a nomination. It is unusual, and as you say, probably not widely commercial work...but might not the gangsta wannabees among us not see something appealing here? Something they can latch on to while ignoring the irony? Something to boost this film over the top? A cult classic in the making? Oh well, I suppose I'm too idealistic. (ps--there were only 2 people at the screening I was at)
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