"Spring Breakers" (2013)

starring James Franco, Vanessa Hudgens, Selena Gomez, Ashley Benson, Rachel Korine, Gucci Mane

Last month I watched another weird, disturbing movie (you know how much I love watching things that are off the beaten path). It was called Spring Breakers, and it came out earlier this year. I thought it was just this lightweight, modern day beach party movie. Um, no.

In one way, it’s about how modern girls relate to one another and how empowered they feel to do whatever they want; in other words, feminist. But in another way, it’s about our society’s fetishizing of youth and particularly of young women, as the camera zooms in on more naked tits and ass than you’d expect in a teen movie starring former Disney stars.

In yet another way, it’s about the aimlessness of today’s generation of youth and their need to constantly push the boundaries of what is physically and emotionally possible and what is socially acceptable, about girls who adopt the trappings of outlaw culture and minority culture in particular as a way to construct identity. Director Harmony Korine uses a muted, soft-focus cinematography in Nebraska, and then a bright, lurid, saturated palette in the Florida scenes; he also uses quick cuts, looped and repetitive dialogue, and weird zooms to emphasize the shallowness of these girls’ dreams and values.

*** SPOILER ALERT ***

The Plot: A group of Midwestern college girls haven’t been able to scrape up enough money to get them to Florida for Spring Break. They are pissed about it, particularly since the dorm has already emptied out. Three girls get zooted on marijuana and cocaine, soup one another up, steal a professor’s car and rob a local chicken shack using ski masks, water pistols, and a lot of male-style aggression. Scooping up a fourth, baby-faced born-again Christian pal (Selena Gomez), who lies to her grandmother about where she is, they board the bus for St. Petersburg. Once there, it’s boys, bikinis, dancing, cussing, screaming, boys, boob flashing, grinding, bong hits, boys, pool parties, coke sniffing, scooter riding, liquor shots, boys, motel room trashing, and all other kinds of inappropriate, over-the-top youth behavior. The girls are loving it, until the police bust in and arrest them all for drug possession. Still in bikinis and sneakers, they are trotted out before a judge who says they can only be released if they produce $10,000 in bail – which of course, they don’t have.

In the morning they are released when a local white drug dealer/rapper named Alien (Franco) posts their bond and tries to impress them with his world of cash, drugs, guns, rap, and sex on the fringes of the black hood. The viewer is left wondering whether this seamy dude (played by James Franco in corn rows and gold fronts, bringing to mind Gary Oldman’s dreadlocked pimp in True Romance) is priming them to turn tricks for him. The Christian girl freaks, cries and begs to go home – as I would have as well. She wants to misbehave, but this criminal – with his Little Ladies Of The Night/wannabe Iceberg Slim rap -- scares the pee out of her. He lets her go, and she tearfully says goodbye and hops the bus. I, for one, am relieved because I’m not sure what debauchery Alien has in store. We understand that whatever happens next, the remaining girls have eagerly co-signed, and that’s where things get really crazy.

Franco is a good actor, but director Korine lets him run rampant with the improv as his character shows himself to be a dim, hop-headed, violent, shallow, semi-serious romantic who jumps on his bed like a grade-schooler while showing the girls the ill-gotten gains of his crimes – almost like Jay Gatsby showing off his shirts to Daisy. He’s a vapid idiot with a gun – but the girls pledge their allegiance as part of their new Charlie’s Angels schtick. Tricked out in a spanking new bikini every day (once they hit Florida, they are never seen in actual clothing), they are down for whatever, from group sex to toting guns and committing more armed robberies. In one twisted sex romp, Alien lets the girls ram a loaded gun in his mouth while he eagerly fellates the barrel.

But Alien has a problem: he’s on a collision course over territory with his childhood friend and competitor Big Arch (rapper Gucci Mane). An armed showdown between them nets one of the Angels a bullet in the arm. Alien is outraged, swearing revenge before he puts that girl and her broken wing on a bus for home as well.

Left with the two hardest core blondes, Alien launches a nighttime attack against Big Arch. While Alien is gunned down within minutes, the yellow-bikinied blondes machine-gun everyone in sight – including Big Arch in the hot tub with two naked chicks -- before placing goodbye kisses on Alien’s cold mug and then motoring away in his souped-up Camaro. It’s no kind of victory. There are so many questions one could ask about the girls’ motivations, and how Alien ever got as far as he did, and why things went so so wrong. But there’s nothing but the lurid lights of the Florida night and a throbbing electronic dance groove.

We're only left with the girls' rallying cry: “Spring break forever, bitches!”


*All pictures are screenshots.