Film: Welcome to the Dollhouse & Harriet the Spy

WELCOME TO THE DOLLHOUSE
Todd Solondz’s Sundance winning black comedy breakthrough is painfully true-to-life adolescent annihilation, a cringe-worthy reminder that school is hell and that kids are the worst. Bitingly funny, sharply detailed and endlessly awkward, Welcome to the Dollhouse follows 11-year-old Dawn Wiener (Heather Matarazzo in a performance for the ages), a junior high geek who just wants to be popular. Teased by her classmates and tormented by the local bully, Dawn uncomfortably navigates lunch room terrors and family traumas while falling for the hunky star of the neighborhood garage band. And hers is the kind of role you rarely see on screen; brutally relatable and completely unforgiving. It’s no wonder the Wienerdog remains an outcast hero and style icon for our generation of misfits. Dollhouse feels like one of the defining indie moments of the ‘90s, perfectly capturing pre-teen agony while still being intensely entertaining and eminently quotable. You won’t be able to look away.

DIRECTOR Todd Solondz
WRITER Todd Solondz
STARRING Heather Matarazzo, Victoria Davis, Christina Brucato, Christina Vidal, Siri Howard, Brendan Sexton III
YEAR 1995
RATED R
COUNTRY USA
FORMAT 35mm
RUNNING TIME 87 minutes

HARRIET THE SPY
Harriet M. Welsch (Michelle Trachtenberg) is probably the world’s most accomplished 11-year-old spy. Harriet dreams of being a writer, and her nanny and best friend Golly (Rosie O’Donnell) told her to start by writing down everything she sees. It’s all in good fun until Harriet’s friends find her secret spy notebook. They don’t like what Harriet’s written. And they don’t like Harriet that much, either. Can Harriet win back her friends, or is she doomed to be an outsider, a rejected writer and forgotten spy? (Paramount)

DIRECTOR Bronwen Hughes
WRITER Screenplay by Douglas Petrie and Theresa Rebeck, Adaptation by Greg Taylor and Julie Talen, Based on Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh
STARRING Michelle Trachtenberg, Gregory Smith, Vanessa Chester, Rosie O’Donnell, J. Smith-Cameron, Robert Joy, Eartha Kitt
YEAR 1996
RATED PG
COUNTRY USA
FORMAT 35mm
RUNNING TIME 101 minutes