THE AISLE SEAT - "ROMY & MICHELE'S HIGH SCHOOL REUNION"

by Mike McGranaghan

I didn't attend my own 10-year high school reunion last summer. To me, it seemed a pointless thing to do. I'm still in contact with most of the people who were my friends in school. As for the others - well, we weren't friends then, so why pretend like we were a decade later? Although I've been accused of being too cynical on the matter, I think most of us are cynical, whether we choose to acknowledge it or not. Let's face it - who doesn't approach such an event with nervous trepidation? Haven't we all had the fantasy of going to a reunion rich, successful, and with the most perfect date ever created on our arms?

The main characters in Romy & Michele's High School Reunion certainly have that fantasy. Romy (Mira Sorvino) and Michele (Lisa Kudrow) are two blonde airheads who were subject to endless scorn in high school (one was chubby, the other wore a neck brace). They were inseparable then and remain so ten years later, as they share a Los Angeles apartment. Romy has a dead-end job as a cashier, Michele is unemployed. Neither has a boyfriend. (This is the part of the film that requires the greatest suspension of disbelief. You aren't likely to find two more gorgeous women on a movie screen than Kudrow and Sorvino.)

One afternoon Romy runs into former classmate Heather Mooney (Janeane Garofalo), a bitter, unpleasant woman who hated everyone in school and continues to hate everyone she encounters. It is Heather who informs Romy about the pending reunion back home in Tucson. Of course, Heather says she would rather put a lit cigarette out on her rear end than attend the event. Romy, however, is psyched and soon Michele is, too. The only problem is that they aren't happy with their lives; they're afraid of what the others will think of them. Intent on making a good impression, they dress up in business suits and concoct a lie about how they became rich inventing Post-it notes.

At the reunion, they run into all kinds of former classmates: the clique of snobbish cheerleaders, the class geek who lusted after Michele, the football star whom Romy always pined for. And of course, Heather Mooney eventually shows up, too, just in time to make everyone miserable with her presence. Despite their elaborate lie, Romy and Michele are still viewed as outcasts (obviously, nobody believes their story about Post-it notes). The fact that others continue to ridicule them remains a source of confusion. Even when they try to play the popularity game, they lose. However, a series of events soon leads to the ultimate fantasy: the class geeks uniting to upstage the snobs.

In description, Romy & Michele's High School Reunion probably sounds like an updated John Hughes film - Pretty in Pink ten years later. In reality, the movie is a smart, surprisingly edgy comedy that exploits the "reunion revenge" fantasy for all its worth. Screenwriter Robin Schiff gives the movie one tart line of dialogue after another, and fills the story with hilariously off-beat characters. The plot often resorts to flashbacks, flash-forwards, and dream sequences to illustrate how Romy and Michele remember things, how those things were in reality, and what the women wish would happen. It's a lot to juggle, but the script is so smart that it works.

Casting Mira Sorvino and Lisa Kudrow in this film was a stroke of genius. Both actresses have demonstrated the ability to take dim-bulb characters and make them sympathetic (Kudrow as Phoebe on Friends, Sorvino in her Oscar winning Mighty Aphrodite performance as Linda). Romy and Michele are utterly superficial. They wear tacky homemade clothes, obsess over their weight, and constantly argue over who's cuter. "Everyone knows," Michele says, "that I'm the Mary and you're the Rhoda." Everything in their life seems to be devoted to trying to impress other people. And yet, in these two women, the one-dimensional traits are charming. They are not your generic superficial stock characters; their behavior is clearly motivated by the lifelong goal of being accepted. If they lack depth, it's because they have been led to believe that popularity is the result of wearing the right clothes and having the right friends. The actresses play their parts with a bouncy energy that provides a lot of laughs. And if both have played similar characters before, it is to their credit that Romy and Michele are completely and utterly different from Phoebe and Linda.

Kudrow and Sorvino have terrific chemistry together, and they play well off the supporting cast, too. Janeane Garofalo is one of my favorite actresses. As Heather, she is a lot of fun to watch, all pent-up anger and hostility. Her character initially seems like just another high-strung witch, but we eventually learn how she got that way and why. I also enjoyed Alan Cummings as the former nerd who comes back a millionaire. In flashbacks, his character is a nervous ball of hormones who (in a great running gag) visibly shows his excitement whenever Michele walks into the room. With the onslaught of success, he develops a calmer, more in-control demeanor. I wish even more screen time had been given to this guy, because his shift is really interesting.

Romy & Michele's High School Reunion is the second film I've seen in a month that deals with class reunions. The other was Grosse Pointe Blank, in which a hitman returns to his school unsure of how to present himself to classmates. Although that film had its moments, it never let the character make up his mind about the reunion. We were never sure how he felt about himself after seeing how everyone else turned out. In contrast, Romy and Michele do show us how they feel. We see them re-evaluating their own self-images after meeting up with old friends and enemies. And while the conclusion they reach may be predictable, it is handled in an unexpectedly satirical way. This is not a movie that says it's okay to love yourself; it says that if others don't like you, screw 'em.

Quirkily directed by David Mirkin, Romy & Michele's High School Reunion is fast and funny, a pointed examination of the moronic nature of popularity. For me, the high point is a dance sequence near the end of the film. Romy and Michele dance with that millionaire nerd as the rest of the class watches. The choreography is hilariously weird, yet with a certain unexpected grace. Watching the three of them dance fearlessly in a strange ballet of geekiness, I realized that the kids who weren't "cool" were often the coolest ones of all.

( out of four)