After a bout of flying nuns and Michael Jackson impersonators, Harmony Korine returns with his most mainstream production yet. A mesmerising tale of a quartet of cash-strapped teenage students, living in small-town USA, that decide that a Florida escapade during spring break is a necessity to lighten up there dim, repetitive existence. Devoid of the monetary means they decide to hold up a local diner, thus already pushing the limits of their expectations as to this excursion. Somewhat the outlier of this group of friends is Faith (Selena Gomez), a bible-hugging devout Christian, who nonetheless knows the worth of going crazy with the like of Candy (Vanessa Hudgens), Brit (Ashley Benson) and Cotty (Rachel Korine).
With the ill-gotten gains they venture to student-crazy Florida beaches, where breasts are bouncing, beer is pouring and the foursome aim to spend a moment of eternal perfection in this vapid spurge of debauchery. Faith wishes for time to stop and the sun and fun to become permanent, as the four friends ride the town on their rad scooters. With a backdrop of destructive parties, lack of hindsight and total no-holds-barred partying, the inevitable occurs as the dream collides with a breath of reality. Enter Alien (James Franco) who offers of prolongation of the dream - undying lack of responsibility for your actions. Faith hits her limit and promptly resigns to return to drab existence, but the remaining threesome delve into the gangster lifestyle of robbing spring breakers and pushing dope. Spring break forever, y'all!!!
Harmony Korine borrows his artistic style heavily from fellow auteur Terrence Mallick, delivering a similarly sombre tone of existentialist dramaturgy, where flashbacks, flash-forwards, jump-cuts and images are juxtaposed to off-camera narration by the characters. Nonetheless Korine introduces a cascading chaos to the proceedings, as if attempting to replicate the drunken orgy that are summer Florida excursions in the way he tells it story. The end result is a unmissable sense of resigned acceptance of the inevitable countered by the joyous bliss of expectations, which basically underpins the whole concept of the movie. The movie falls back on spring break as a hopeless attempt to remain young and live the eternal party, dauntlessly striving to avoid the lingering reality to filter through teenage euphoria.
The artistic premise works well, although people either unaccustomed or repulsed by Mallick's method of storytelling may be taken back by the hypnotic narrative. Nonetheless severe flaws populate the overall movie, as Korine decides to forgo certain structural story-telling necessities or dashes headfirst into logical pitfalls, thus severely weakening the overall impact. At one point, for example, you can't help but wonder how a semi-renowned characteristically looking gangster-rapper like Alien can audaciously hold up people at gunpoint without any police blow-back.
The biggest issue itself is the presentation of the female leads. Or its lack. Apart from Faith, who is given some background as to her church praying everyday life and some insight into her thought processes (with a key monologue about the mundanity of life), the remaining threesome are an amorphous being, which are hard to differentiate from each other, not only as to their character traits, but also physically. Rachel Korine stands out somewhat with her pink hair, but it took me the better part of 40 minutes to distinguish the actresses between each other and with the closing credits I still had no sense of identity to any of them. This in part brings about the misogynist accusations, which are sometimes hurdled at the movie. With such disposable barely-clad anti-heroines with strong sexual innuendos often present, the overall concept tends to be laid to waste by the utter lack of interest into who exactly these women are.
With the ill-gotten gains they venture to student-crazy Florida beaches, where breasts are bouncing, beer is pouring and the foursome aim to spend a moment of eternal perfection in this vapid spurge of debauchery. Faith wishes for time to stop and the sun and fun to become permanent, as the four friends ride the town on their rad scooters. With a backdrop of destructive parties, lack of hindsight and total no-holds-barred partying, the inevitable occurs as the dream collides with a breath of reality. Enter Alien (James Franco) who offers of prolongation of the dream - undying lack of responsibility for your actions. Faith hits her limit and promptly resigns to return to drab existence, but the remaining threesome delve into the gangster lifestyle of robbing spring breakers and pushing dope. Spring break forever, y'all!!!
Harmony Korine borrows his artistic style heavily from fellow auteur Terrence Mallick, delivering a similarly sombre tone of existentialist dramaturgy, where flashbacks, flash-forwards, jump-cuts and images are juxtaposed to off-camera narration by the characters. Nonetheless Korine introduces a cascading chaos to the proceedings, as if attempting to replicate the drunken orgy that are summer Florida excursions in the way he tells it story. The end result is a unmissable sense of resigned acceptance of the inevitable countered by the joyous bliss of expectations, which basically underpins the whole concept of the movie. The movie falls back on spring break as a hopeless attempt to remain young and live the eternal party, dauntlessly striving to avoid the lingering reality to filter through teenage euphoria.
The artistic premise works well, although people either unaccustomed or repulsed by Mallick's method of storytelling may be taken back by the hypnotic narrative. Nonetheless severe flaws populate the overall movie, as Korine decides to forgo certain structural story-telling necessities or dashes headfirst into logical pitfalls, thus severely weakening the overall impact. At one point, for example, you can't help but wonder how a semi-renowned characteristically looking gangster-rapper like Alien can audaciously hold up people at gunpoint without any police blow-back.
The biggest issue itself is the presentation of the female leads. Or its lack. Apart from Faith, who is given some background as to her church praying everyday life and some insight into her thought processes (with a key monologue about the mundanity of life), the remaining threesome are an amorphous being, which are hard to differentiate from each other, not only as to their character traits, but also physically. Rachel Korine stands out somewhat with her pink hair, but it took me the better part of 40 minutes to distinguish the actresses between each other and with the closing credits I still had no sense of identity to any of them. This in part brings about the misogynist accusations, which are sometimes hurdled at the movie. With such disposable barely-clad anti-heroines with strong sexual innuendos often present, the overall concept tends to be laid to waste by the utter lack of interest into who exactly these women are.