"Who cares about this stupid election?" asks dark-horse student body presidential candidate Tammy Metzler (Jessica Campbell). The crowd, which had been jeering and booing seconds ago, is rendered speechless. As Tammy launches into a scathing tirade against the frivolity and futility of the school election process, she unveils her platform; if elected, she will dismantle the student government, so no one will have to sit through another stupid assembly. The uproarious response nearly incites a riot.
The clothesline of Election’s plot may be the campaign for the highest office at Carver High, but it goes far deeper than that. Tammy’s speech may be in the context of a high school election, but you don’t have to go far to find people who feel the same way about democracy on a national level. During the 2004 Presidential election, I was always taken aback when people told me they were so apathetic to the possible outcome that they didn’t feel the need to vote.
Although I ultimately can’t fathom this to be true, I can see their point. For the common man, would a choice between Bush or Kerry or Bush or Gore or so fourth really affect their lives that much? People would still obsess over football, go to church, pay taxes, complain about gas prices and the weather, and do whatever it is that they do. Though the world has pressing issues that will always burden the thoughtful and the attentive, how can we not blame the political system for the blithe attitude of so many eligible voters? Tammy’s popularity to the students brings thoughts of Ross Perot and Ralph Nader to mind; both men were able to get millions of votes simply by offering to buckle the system.
Cynicism laces Election’s every frame, the agonizing knowledge that things don't always work out hanging overhead like an executioner’s axe. The film has no heroes or villains, only deeply flawed characters struggling to get what they need through dirty tricks and ignoring the truth, especially in regard to themselves.
It begins with a brief encounter between social studies teacher Jim McAllister (Matthew Broderick, showing the other side of the Ferris Bueller coin) and Tracy Flick (Reese Witherspoon), the leading (and at first, the only) candidate for student body president, who views the position as her birthright. Jim can’t stand Tracy, a know-it-all whose phony cheeriness conceals a bitter, venomous nature willing to surmount all obstacles to get ahead. He also holds a perverse lust for her, partially out of jealously of her ambition, partially out of anger over her affair with a math teacher friend. Jim serves as the advisor to the student government, and if Tracy gets elected, they will be working with one another on a daily basis. Jim’s narration would like us to think that he just didn’t like her, but his fear of giving in to his lust for her is paralyzing.
In response, Jim talks rich-kid and school hero Paul Metzler (Chris Klein) into running against Tracy. Paul may be popular and sweet natured, but is also as dumb as a post, and insanely under-qualified (Before any George W. Bush comparisons spring to mind, this film was released in 1999). His sister Tammy decides to throw her hat in the ring, not to spite Paul, but to spite his girlfriend, who used to be her lover.
Jim and the three candidates provide narration’s throughout the film, and all but Paul’s are highly unreliable. The intelligent characters all have unfulfilled desires; Jim wants forbidden fruit, both in the form of Tracy and a lonely divorcee. Tracy longs for power, but also to be accepted by her peers. Tammy claims "I’m attracted to the person. It just that all the people I’ve been attracted to happen to be girls." The willingness of the three to manipulate the system to suit their own goals readily brings the average contemporary politician to mind. Just as in the real world, everybody loves democracy, as long as they get their way.
This was director Alexander Payne’s second film out of four thus far. The others were Citizen Ruth (1996), About Schmidt (2002), and Sideways (2004). All are wickedly funny, and the latter three often lash out at the notion that intelligent people are ever really satisfied with life. By far the bleakest, Election benefits the most from repeat viewings, something that can be accurately said of very few films. The many layers would take much longer than a simple review to peel back; morals vs. ethics, the degrees of truth to what each character says, the minutia of high school life (such as the gum-chewing principal, the pre-packaged monotony of class, the ridiculous popularity contests), and the often failing state of the political system. It never takes sides with any of the characters, as they are all equally culpable for the mess they’ve created for themselves and others.
It has been very unfortunately marketed as a teen movie, though it is definitely not. I’ve never seen a teen film with so many meaningful things to say, this much sharp writing and humor, this pessimistic of a worldview. The humor relies on the absurdity of the characters and the worlds they inhabit, instead of the uninspired misfit jokes of the norm. Election grossed poorly at the box office, and has been relegated to the video shelves and cable TV. Here lies a case where depth may have hurt the short-term survival prospects; the audience expects one thing, and get something much better, but very different. Nonetheless, a film with a cachet this accomplished deserves respect; far more so than its characters.
5 out of 5
