Rocket Science

Rocket Science is a film that is purely a gesture, it does not seem to want to entertain, for it is self-indulgent of its director. The film concerns Hal Hefner, a 15-year-old high schooler with a very odd, dysfunctional family (obligatory in indie films) and a terrible stutter. This has made Hal a loner. He seeks help from a speech therapist, but the guy is an idiot. One day as Hal looks longingly up at the school's legendary debater, he sees himself as a man who can talk as fast and with as much conviction. This creates the tone for the film, which is so unrealistic and idealistic that it's obnoxious. Songs that don't have anything to do with the story enter into inappropriate scenes as well. This shows the director's need to show us what he wants to, even if it doesn't fit. As Hal (Reece Thompson) is recruited by a girl debater named Ginny (Anna Kendrick), another indie cliché is set up, where the kid who couldn't gets the girl and the esteem. However, the film throws a curveball on this, and although the film is essentially a bad sports movie in disguise as an inspirational indie film, the curve helps. The main problem the film encounters, despite how much we care for its characters, is how obviously constructed it is. Entire lines of dialogue and actions feel excrutiatingly labored over. You can just imagine the filmmakers sitting around discussing how the clichéd film their making would usually go, so they ad-lib some words or pieces of furniture or "edgy" things. "Hey guys, instead of him throwing a chair lets have him throw a cello!" Rocket Science contains decent sequences and amiable characters, but the way they are undermined by a pretentious and clichéd plot makes it not only a mediocre film, but constantly frustrating. The film lastly feels as if it were made to please its director, who obviously has a personal stake within the stuttering portions. Doing this makes it unappealing for anyone else.
Rocket Science: ★★