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Jon Poll’s Charlie Bartlett, which looks at the issue of rigidity in public schools, is thought-provoking, says
Ervell E. Menezes
What’s it like in public schools these days? It’s a subject that crops up from time to time getting more shocking with each outing. Lindsay Anderson’s If in the late 1960s was a shocking and to a lesser degree The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and Dead Poet’s Society. The latest in that line is Charlie Bartlett where the hero`A0in his quest for popularity turns his school upside down and inside out. For starters, Charlie (Anton Yelchin) is pampered by his narcissist mother (Hope Davis) whose husband is in jail and the entire responsibility of bringing up her son up doesn’t rest lightly on her shoulders. Chauffeured about, he earns the envy of some of his fellow students, especially the class bully`A0Murphy (Tyler Hilton). Alcoholic principal Gardner (Robert Downey Jr) is another who gets even more bugged when his daughter Susan (Kat Dennings) has a crush on Charlie. But Charlie, who isn’t any Charlie as the saying goes, has a way of winning friends and influencing people and being himself a regular on the couch he disperses his know-how to his fellow students to don the mantle of a "resident psychiatrist." Not surprisingly, he wins over Murphy and lets him share the spoils. With the plot taking some audacious twists and turns even the alcoholic principal joins the club. In today’s fast-changing world where the young ones are better equipped to deal with the information revolution the elders seem to be lagging behind. In fact, his ma is a clear case in point, giving in to his every whim and fancy and hesitating to correct him at all. It all boils down to what they really want in life and they don’t seem to have the answers. The school system and its rigidity`A0are to blame but is there an`A0alternative? Director Jon Poll is endowed with an intricate problem because the screenplay by Gestin Nash is very daring and hence is given an Ibsenesque treatment.`A0The narrative shuttles from the sublime to the ridiculous and our hero seems to do the impossible but at the end of the day it all seems to fall in place, even if vaguely so, and at best it gives one a ring-side view of what seems possible with the youth`A0these days. It is more thought-provoking than entertaining and newcomer Anton Yelchin manages to hold his own and it isn’t easy when one sees the infinite variety of characters he encounters. Robert Downey Jr. however cuts a sorry figure and that is sad because over a decade ago he was one of the most promising young actors. It is the character, or rather the caricature, he has to play. In that respect Hope Davis is much better doing justice to a rather difficult role and with an amount of panache. As for the film Charlie Bartlett, it may not go down too easily to some`A0but it might well be worth a look, even if to anticipate the shape of things to come.
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