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HAIR HIGH (2007) (***)

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For famed animator Bill Plympton, HAIR HIGH marks his most conventional and widely accessible feature film to date. Partly due to a more traditional plot structure, the film lacks some of the no holds barred originality of his best works like I MARRIED A STRANGE PERSON!, but in taking stabs at high school, the films about high school and the 1950s while adding in a dose of horror, he makes an engaging satire that retains his signature sense of style and humor.

Rod (Dermot Mulroney, ABOUT SCHMIDT) and Cherri (Sarah Silverman, SCHOOL OF ROCK) are the "it" couple at Echo Lake High. He's the hot rod driving, football star and she is the beautiful cheerleader. One day, the new kid Spud (Eric Gilliland) accidentally nicks the paint on Spud's car, which leads Rod to turn Spud into Cherri's slave. As these stories go, Spud and Cherri start off as bitter enemies, but eventually fall in love. So when Rod finds out that Spud has asked Cherri to the prom, he sets out to get his violent revenge.

Though some of the jokes either fall flat or have been done before, more times than not Plympton finds some inspired lunacy to poke fun at his targets. I particularly enjoyed his take on football with a sex-crazed mascot on the loose. He does a nice job of skewering the sport as well as how some schools take it way too seriously. Plympton's twisted sense of humor works best when it's dark, which gives inspiration to the macabre, CARRIE-like twist at the end. Additionally, Plympton finds some wonderful sights gags to include that visually display the thoughts and emotions of his characters in funny and clever ways. He gives new meaning to the phrase, "coughing up a lung."

In addition to Mulroney and Silverman, Plympton has put together an impressive voice cast for the film, including Ed Begley Jr., David Carradine, Keith Carradine, Beverly D'Angelo, Peter Jason, Justin Long, Martha Plimpton, Craig Bierko, SIMPSONS creator Matt Groening and Oscar-nominated, indie animator Don Hertzfeldt. The voice cast is great, but unfortunately the sound is scratchy and hollow at times. The sound issues were really distracting at first, but lessened as the story developed (or because I was more engaged became less of an annoyance).

Seeing any world through the eyes of Bill Plympton is a treat. His take on sex and violence is often brilliantly original. Much better than his last film, MUTANT ALIENS, but not as completely inspired as STRANGE PERSON, HAIR HIGH is a great starting point for anyone interested in his work. Though this story is more conventional and serves as a satire of primarily live-action films, Plympton is at his best when he uses the boundary breaking advantages of animation to comment on a given situation. At its best moments, HAIR HIGH reminds us of the freedom that animation can afford an artist that live-action, even with all the visual trickery money can buy, could ever provide.

Rick DeMott's picture

Rick DeMott
Animation World Network
Creator of Rick's Flicks Picks