Customer Reviews

The Education of Charlie Banks

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(12)
3 star:		(18)
2 star:		(9)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

The star of the Education of Charlie Banks is Jesse Eisenberg, now an Oscar nominated actor for another movie you might have heard about: The Social Network (Two-Disc Collector's Edition). This probably is a good thing, because Jesse's new found popularity are going to be bringing in fans to this lesser known film, and one that I quite enjoyed, "The Education of Charlie Banks".

Easy to classify under "Coming of Age" movie, this flick tells the tale of Charlie, who is haunted from an event in his past that comes back to haunt him college. Mick, played in a very nuanced way by Jason Ritter, is the source of this tension, and the two become allies, of a sort, despite the incident. Toss in Eva Amurri (one of my favorite reasons that I love Saved!, and you have an interesting, tense, and although sometimes unfocused, story.

The Education of Charlie Banks was an interesting story, told by first time director Fred Durst. I hope he continues to make movies, for there is much potential in his directing.

While some may be skeptical of Fred Durst's directorial debut, he shows some promise. Competent, yet distant, most of my reservations about recommending "Charlie Banks" have to do with the film's plotting and characterizations. The primary story revolves around two roommates at an Ivy League college and what happens when an old "friend" with a checkered and violent past shows up for an indefinite stay. A good set-up that lacks a bit of pay-off.

A well made film, "The Education of Charlie Banks" is a movie I wanted to admire. However, something kept me at arm's length--I never really connected emotionally in a way that would have made my viewing experience more compelling. I think, perhaps, I never fully embraced Charlie Banks (Jesse Eisenberg) as the narrator or centerpiece of the film. His "education" or development just wasn't that intriguing and my lack of concern for him created somewhat of a void in the center of the film. Eisenberg was terrific in "The Squid and the Whale" and "Roger Dodger," his character just seems a little undercooked here.

Ironically, the strangest bit of casting was the most effective. Jason Ritter, as bad boy Mick, seems a little soft and gentle to be the reprobate he is supposed to be in this film. But Ritter commands the screen. The story really works better as "The Education of Mick." As Mick infiltrates the university and strives to fit in, the story is on solid ground. I was fascinated by this aspect and think Ritter brilliantly brought balance to Mick's conflicted emotions about this alien world he doesn't belong to. With a different focus--I think this might have made an extraordinary film! But, as is, most of the film left me ambivalent. Easy enough to watch, but not much to remember. About 3 1/2 stars from me--mostly for Ritter. KGHarris, 07/09

Movie - 2.5/4

A coming of age movie in which an innocent young man, Charlie, witnesses a brutal criminal, Mick, savagely beat two jocks at a party. While he at first goes to the cops and rats Mick out, he ends reversing course and the charges are dropped.

Years later Mick and Charlie meet again when he unexpectedly shows up at Charlie's Ivy League college where Mick interjects himself into his life. Mick remains an unwanted presence taking the girl Charlie likes and sleeping with her repeatedly. Mick is just as brutally violent as before and it will ultimately have consequences as Charlie learns why Mick is there in the first place.

This is not a family movie of any sorts and teaches us that you can be depraved and get away with it. Rated R, 1.78:1 widescreen. English and Spanish subtitles.

Audio - 3/4 - The soundtrack is well done and never overwhelming. Underwhelming at times though and the music leaves something to be desired.

Video - 3/4 - For DVD it is clean throughout with some noticeable grain. The image is flat and the colors are not as vibrant as they could be.

Supplements - 1/4 - a commentary track and a behind the scenes look.

Over all - 2.5/4 - I enjoyed watching the film, but would probably never buy it. This is a strong "B" movie and a good start for Fred Durst. I was never 'shocked' by the language, sex, violence, or drug use, while all those elements were there. If you like this type of movie, rent before purchasing.

I saw this movie pretty much because of "The Social Network". I thought it would be interesting to see Eisenberg in a pre-Social Network college film. I watched the audio commentary of Social Network and Fincher said he had seen Charlie Banks prior to making Social Network.

I don't know much about Durst but found it funny that he was the director of this. He definitely has ambition and you can tell he put a lot of work into this. The acting is pretty good. I was happy to see John Ritter's son turning in good work. The movie starts out about Charlie but becomes more about the Ritter character. Kind of uneven, and there's not enough story. What's there is fine, but it just seems undeveloped, kind of like its young characters.

So it's an affectionate thumbs down. With a better script, Durst might really surprise us one day.

P.S. (spoiler) There is the threat of violence in a scene that made me cringe. It was really well done. Scorsese would nod his head in approval.

2 out of 4

Directorial debut by Limp Bizkit, Fred Durst, is just so bad. Fred would have never thought to play some incredibly complex guitar shredding piece on his first gig in public. Instead, he chose to take on The Great Gatsby a very difficult film / story in capable hands, and fails miserably as a director. This might sound a bit extreme, but sadly Fred should just keep playing the guitar, he overtells his story, over makes his points, and just flat out doesn't understand film language.

The first clue this film would be a problem - opening black screen, white statement *New York City*. Then cut to a city scene. Then black screen with white type *Late nineteen seventies.* Then we go on to see a bus ride and the first voice over dialog is about how this is Greenwich Village. We then see somebody dressed in bell bottom jeans, hear 1970's music. This is called beating your audience over the head with a sledge hammer. Either a director is skillful at setting the scene and time period through visuals and dialog; or he has no skill at it and resorts to subtitles warning the audience. Now the worst part of all this, there was no reason why this had to be set in Greenwich Village or New York City; or the late or early 1970's. None of it mattered.

There was a glaring nasty mistake in the era language. Mick is said to *tag* a wall, and that he beat up somebody that put a *tag* over his. In that era, the word tag was never used to talk about grafitti. It was called grafitti then. Tags happened in the 90's and 2000's, not the 70's.

So Durst has no ability to set the stage for the film, create an era, give a feeling of the period and make that important (he resorts to titles to do that work). He then goes on with sledge hammer after sledge hammer of redundancies. You would think that somebody this talented at music would know how to use music to enhance the film. Instead he bludgeons the viewer to death with impending doom music after the viewer has seen that something wrong is going to happen. The music music, not the sounds trying to telegraph emotions, was excellent. This would be a good soundtrack to purchase.

Jesse Eisenberg - he's so geeky, he moves as badly as Jeff Goldblum (that means he has no idea how to move on camera), is he Michael Cera, is he Patrick Fudgit? No he's none of them, but he's all of them blended together. He sort of blends into the background. Jason Ritter, yes the performance is good. But he looks like Matt LeBlanc's younger brother, and seems to be Joey Tribiani, only mean. It's just so hard not to think of him that way. Eva Amuri as the hottsie totsie Mary, did get the early 80's look solid. She was well cast and delivered a decent performance. Chris Marquette as Danny, Charlie's best friend, was decent. Sebastian Stan, did a decent job as Leo, the rich kid everyone loves to hate. But his pontificating was just awful most of the time.

If you know the Great Gatsby story, you have the plot line of this film. There's some roles jumbled around, but in general, it's the whole Great Gatsby thing. F. Scott Fitzgerald would be upset about this adaptation.

Film wise, there's a lot wrong here. The film is easily 20 minutes too long (run time of 1 hour 40 minutes). Durst has no idea when to make his point and move on. He lingers too long on almost every plot point. Surround sound was good. Sadly the music was much louder than the dialog. I had to run the movie with subtitles enabled so as not to blow out the neighbors during the musical portions of the movie. This is just plain sad mix. Fortunately, almost all shots are in focus. Cameras are steady, they did not resort to very much hand held random movements.

A solid indicator for me that a film is too long, the 2X fast forward button gets hit. This is just fast enough to get out of most dragging scenes, and the subtitles remain, so the plot can still be followed. I am pretty sure after the first 1/2 hour, this movie got about 15 or 20 moments of 2X fast forwarding (a very high bad number).

The DVD includes a 23 minute yammering conversations behind the making of THe Education of Charlie Banks. It's the classic same old actor talking about their character, banal description of what you've already seen on screen. The only tidbit, apparently the story is based on something that happened to the screenwritter. Aside from that, if you watch the movie, you've seen everything they tell you about in this 23 minutes. Well skippable.

The movie is rated R for strong language. There's a pretty nasty fight scene early on. The sound effects are brutally realistic. Normal Hollywood would have a huge bottle crash and breakage when a person gets hit in the head by a beer bottle. The real sound is probably more like what was in this film, a very loud sharp thud with no breakage. It was gut wrenching to say the least. There is no nudity, well except a scene from the rear where Jason Ritter strips down and jumps in the hot tub (NYPD blue showed more on television). There are a couple of senuous scenes, but it's all pretty chaste.

I really did not care for this movie. It's not the topic, it's not that I don't understand what was trying to be told; I just appreciate well made film. This one is a very poorly made film by somebody that should stick with his music career. Fred Durst understands the language of music, he does not understand film language.

"The Education of Charlie Banks" showcases the talents of Fred Durst in his directorial debut. The film takes you on a journey from the three main characters Charlie (Jesse Eisenberg), Mick (Jason Ritter) and Danny (Christopher Marquette) growing up in Greenwich Village, New York to their life at the privileged Ivy League Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York in 1980. Charlie and Danny are upper class who cross paths with the street tough Mick, whose raw charms befriend their circle of Vassar friends, including the girl who Charlie adores, Mary (Eva Amurri). The movie is beautifully filmed from the fenced in playgrounds in Greenwich Village to the beautifully manicured lawns of Vassar College.

The film keeps you watching, as you cannot guess how this drama of the street wise Mick, who has integrated himself into Charlie's life at Vassar, will end. This film was a winner in the Made in NY Award, from the Tribeca Film Festival. Special Features include Audio Commentary with director Fred Durst and actor Jason Ritter, with Conversations Behind the movie. The one actor who stands out with real star quality in this film is Jason Ritter who plays the tough, street wise Mick. He has the natural handsome good looks that remind me of a combination of Jim Morrison and Matt Dillon. Jason plays Mick in a very Dr.Jekyl/Mr.Hyde sort of way with a cruel personality that is loaded with raw charisma. For anyone who likes Coming of Age College films, it's recommended.

Thoughtful, albeit imperfect, coming-of-age drama set in NYC during the late 1970's-early 1980's. Story revolves around Charlie, an intelligent, sensitive teenager (Jeffery Eisenberg of "The Squid & The Whale" and "Adventureland" fame) who has eagerly left behind his awkward days growing up as a middle-class child in NYC in order to attend an ivy-league school. One day, Charlie receives an unwelcome surprise visit from Mick (Jason Ritter of television's "Joan of Arcadia"), a fearsome, none-too-smart, streetwise neighborhood bully from Charlie's old NYC days. Mick requests to bunk with Charlie at his dorm for a few days (for reasons known only to Mick), but soon a two-day visit becomes an indefinite residency, as Mick takes a liking to his new environment... and Charlie.

This leisurely paced low-budget indie undeniably relies a little too often on tired coming-of-age cliches, with a script that often feels half-baked, including some weakly-sketched characters. Nevertheless, there are some fine performances to be found within this film, and the acting ensemble works well together (including an enjoyable turn from Ritter as the dangerously unpredictable, yet strangely likable bully).

The script also touches upon truthful observations about social stratums within American society, how they are reinforced and maintained; yes, it's "Fitzgerald-light", but nevertheless, when the film tackles these themes of social class (and leaves behind the coming-of-age cliches), "The Education of Charlie Banks" becomes refreshingly ambitious, and therefore intriguing.

Regarding the technical aspects of the DVD, the widescreen anamorphic transfer is competent, but rather dull and soft, befitting its ultra-low-budget origins. The transfer works just fine for the film, but it's hardly home theater system demo material; ditto, the 5.1 audio.

The extras include a rather flat audio commentary track from first-time film director (and ex-"Limp Bizkit" frontman) Fred Durst and actor Jason Ritter, as well as a (slightly) more interesting 23 minute making-of doc.

In all, "The Education of Charlie Banks" stands as a promising, if imperfect, film debut from director Fred Durst, and is worth a viewing for those so inclined.

I'm not going to waste space with a synopsis, since there is one right on this page, so I'll just give you my thoughts. I found this movie to be terribly uneven and uneventful. What you would expect is a darkly tinged coming of age tale, what you receive is a director trying too hard to make this into a classic, which it just could not be. The film is overly long and perhaps if more time was spent in the editing room it may run a bit smoother and not lag in so many places. It's not particularly well acted, the script is linear and flat, and the direction is mediocre at best. I really wanted to like this because it sounds great, but let's face it; it's been done before and done much better. But it's not all bad, unfortunately the bad does outshine the good aspects here.

I received this DVD through Amazon's Vine program and have had it for a while before watching it. I'm not sure why I chose it but I do like - and review - "independent" cinema..

Well, I set aside time to watch it and really didn't grab my attention. It's another "coming of age" film and I thought the direction was sloppy and acting just "okay". There are lots of other reviews of the film here so I won't waste your time with a long review. It was a long movie and just didn't stand out in any way.

Steve Ramm
"Anything Phonographic"

I was impressed by the performances of the core cast, especially Jesse Eisenberg and Jason Ritter, but the dialogue/storyline, while interesting, could've been better. I think the writer was trying be a little too subtle exploring the issues of class, appearance, honor and redemption/forgiveness.

While he's no Hitchcock, Fred Durst did a decent job as a first time director.

I'd recommend this one as a rental, but not one to purchase for repeat viewings.