The Faculty (1998) (Courtesy Of: Young Hollywood! At: www.young-hollywood.com/usherfilm.htm DIRECTED BY: Robert Rodriguez RUNS: 101 min. RATED: R CAST: Elijah Wood (Casey) Josh Hartnett (Zeke) Clea Duvall (Stokely) Jordana Brewster (Delilah) Shawn Hatosy (Stan) Laura Harris (Marybeth) Usher Raymond (Gabe) Salma Hayek (Nurse Harper) Jon Stewart (Mr. Furlong) Robert Patrick (Coach Willis) Bebe Neuwirth (Principal Drake) Piper Laurie (Miss Olsen) Christopher McDonald (Casey's Dad) Famke Janssen (Miss Burke)
Returning to form, screenwriter Kevin Williamson has once again taken on a widely popular film genre and turned it on its ear in The Faculty, a slick, clever collaboration with director Robert Rodriguez. As he did with the sleeper smash hit Scream, Williamson plays with the conventions of the genre he seeks to imitate, in this case, science fiction. The end result is a fast-paced entertaining film.
Six students, ranging from geeky social outcasts to the captain of the football team, suspect that their teachers have been taken over by aliens. Leading this group of young conspiracy theorists is Casey (Wood), a high school dweeb destined to be picked on and harassed throughout his years in school. He discovers a bizarre biological artifact on the football field that he shows to popular science teacher Mr. Furlong (Stewart), who drops it in a fish tank when it reacts to a drop of water. The thing splits in two, grows teeth, and takes a huge bite out of Mr. Furlong's fingers. But that is not all that is weird.
For one thing, the teachers seem to be drinking an awful lot of water. But the clincher occurs when Casey and pretty school paper editor Delilah (Brewster) are snooping in the faculty lounge. Hiding in the closet when two faculty members walk in, Coach Willis (Patrick) and drama teacher Miss Olsen (Laurie), Casey and Delilah witness the two teachers virtually attack Nurse Harper (Hayek) and pass along the alien being via the ear. The students escape, but of course, no one believes their story. Pretty soon, all the influential members of the student body are being called into the office for "ear exams," whereupon the mysterious parasite is passed along.
As the student population is taken over, Casey and Delilah begin to seek help amongst the ever-shrinking remaining human population of Herrington High. Delilah turns to boyfriend Stan (Hatosy), the now ex-captain of the football team. Casey seeks out science fiction guru Stokely (Duvall), who, in a scene reminiscent of Jamie Kennedy's horror film geek in Scream, fills Casey in on the standard conventions of the science fiction genre. The four of them are soon joined by the highly intelligent, super-cool über-slacker Zeke (Hartnett), and the sweet Southern new girl Marybeth (Harris) when they are interrupted by good old Mr. Furlong. Seems he too has a bad case of alien invasion and attempts to turn the apparently last normal students in the school. They all escape and must now figure out how to save the school and themselves.
To be sure, The Faculty does have some plot holes -- none of which can really be revealed here without giving away major points of the story -- but by and large these are easily overlooked for the sake of keeping the film moving. What The Faculty does have to offer, though, is a smart, witty script that keeps itself very tongue-in-cheek with most of the action of the movie. Williamson also has taken the time (as he did in Scream) to develop the youths that are the focus of the main story. There are numerous other subplots (such as Stan's discontent at being a mere jock, Casey's constant pining over Delilah, and the six students' general mistrust of each other) that make this more than just an aliens invading earth flick, and the cast of largely unknown young actors carry the film very well.
On the flip side, the teachers are a bit underdeveloped. While The Faculty takes a small group of students and focuses on them as victims and heroes until the end, the actual faculty is primarily only in the picture for the first half of the movie. After the first third has passed, just about everyone is an alien anyway, so the whole concept of "the teachers are aliens" has lost a bit of its meaning -- because the students are now, too. It might have been nice to have seen a little bit more of the teachers acting weird before their secret is out, especially with all of the interesting cast names that populate the faculty lounge at Herrington High. In the end, some of their parts seem unfortunately small.
That bit aside, The Faculty is still a highly satisfying science fiction thriller. This is largely in part thanks to the tight, exciting direction by Rodriguez in addition to the interesting premise of the plot. Fans of Williamson should be forewarned, however, that this is not a slasher movie, but rather a science fiction film with the Kevin Williamson touch. In other words, teens and teachers don't die, they just...change. Still, The Faculty delivers plenty of squeamish thrills and explosive excitement and essentially rewards the viewer with a new twist on an otherwise overplayed genre, the modern Kevin Williamson-inspired teen slasher film. But perhaps it is only a matter of time before Williamson parodies those, too.
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