Something of a documentary. Based on apparently true(ish) events portrayed in the media; a controversy that centred upon the series of high profile burglaries at the luxurious piles of realty (rather than reality) dotted around the hills of Hollywood.
'Let's go shopping!' takes on a whole new meaning. They shopped, but before they did so, they robbed. We see the co-conspirators up the ante until they can up it no more. But by then they have broken into the home of every celebrity they've ever obsessed about.
This is a film all about obsession. If you look carefully enough you can see it there, lurking in the shadows. It drives the most outrageously antisocial behaviour. It masquerades as age appropriate rebellion, but these girls are not your average run-of-the-mill Valley girls. This is a different breed altogether. This is the special and different brigade.
The clues are there for the discerning. There is a distinct absence of parental participation throughout (with the exception of one fanatic of 'The Secret'), the fact that these girls (plus the rather endearing young man they take willing hostage) are never seen to wear the same clothes twice (let alone killer heels, handbag or sunglasses) seems to go unnoticed. One is left to imagine where on earth they store their haul before passing it on to even less attractive individuals.
Whilst the lines of coke they snort seem endless, and the crack they smoke seems to last forever, what troubled me most was the total lack of intelligence possessed by any of these young people. Obsession had, it seemed, taken over, and consumed the space where rational thought might once have been found. Which makes for a fascinating, yet dull film. There is very little to be said for the script, which does not engage its audience. For sure, they know their Hermes from their Prada, but beyond that... They are bored and, after 90 minutes, I was beginning to know how they felt.
Theirs are lives lived without gratitude. In spite of the near constant sunshine, and the opportunities that clearly surround these youngsters, they are all too busy wanting to be people and things they are not intended to be. They strive so hard to emulate those whose lives they voyeuristically chart through the media, they have never had the opportunity to consider their own identities.
And the real shame is that no one seems to have noticed. They've been disciplined by the schools they once attended. They are in the hands of an 'alternative' education system. (The options are decidedly limited: the LA high school they've so proudly named Idiot Hills, or the world according to 'The Secret'). No one seems to care. The adolescents we meet are over indulged victims of acute neglect and deprivation.
They have had no chance to truly thrive. They are consequently emotionally and psychologically retarded. See, beneath their love of labels and all things shiny, behind the array of oversized sunglasses, we have here some very disturbed teens. Their distress is articulated in an unusual manner, but it is designed to capture the attention they crave.
And this desperate attempt to capture the gaze of their caregivers goes a little too far. It spirals out of control, as they fail to find the boundaries they long for. For, when you are lost, you seek direction. When you're off the rails, you hope to somehow return to them. The behaviours that cause us full-growns to frown upon those with fewer years' experience, are in fact profoundly reassuring developmental milestones instrumental to and indicative of the fulfilment of our inherent potential. But we must be met in our acting out. For it is the way in which we are met, and consistently supported that is predictive of our successful (though rarely smooth) transition towards adulthood and the scary landscape of the real world and responsibility.
The investigation and subsequent proceedings might just as well have focused on those who had attained legal competence. Those who claimed they had no idea as to what their children had been doing all those evenings. They who seemed so oblivious to the impossibly high end wardrobes of their offspring. In this particular instance, I tend to agree with the title of one of Oliver James' excellent books that is, in my humble opinion, well worth reading.
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