Home > Movies > Welcome to the Dollhouse > Reviews

Welcome to the Dollhouse Review: One of the most honest films ever made about adolescence, Todd Solondz's Welcome to the Dollhouse is a brutal, caustically hilarious ode to the seventh ring of hell that is the seventh grade. Solondz approaches his material as a survivor: in the character of Dawn Wiener, it is easy to see the director himself, the ostracized geek used as a bottom rung by his peers as they climbed the social ladder. But rather than use his position behind the camera to craft a redemptive tale of a spunky outcast who gets revenge on her tormenters, Solondz is more interested in bleak, mundane reality. Dawn (played to perfection by Heather Matarazzo) doesn't possess the subversive intelligence or creative inclinations that usually endear social misfits to an audience; if you removed her thick glasses, there wouldn't be a beautiful swan hiding underneath, just an awkward girl who can't see. Most tellingly, Dawn doesn't want revenge on her tormenters: she wants to be accepted by them. More than anything else, junior high is about survival. If Dawn can make it to the eighth grade, she's one year closer to escape; and, in the pockmarked scheme of puberty, escape is about all you can hope for. Rebecca Flint Marx, All Movie Guide

Browse More Movies:
# A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z