Film Review: Election

Director: Alexander Payne

A 1999 film by writer and director Alexander Payne which was adapted from the novel of the same name by Tom Perrotta. The novel itself was inspired by two events: The first was the 1992 Bush vs. Clinton election campaign, in which Ross Perot entered as a third party candidate. The second was an incident at Memorial High School in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, in which a pregnant student was elected homecoming queen, but staff announced a different winner and burned the ballots to cover it up.

Paul Meltzer (Chris Klein) and Tracy Enid Flick (Reese Witherspoon)

Jim (Matthew Broderick) is a high school teacher in small town near Omaha, here he encounters the student class elections with over zealous student Tracy (Reese Witherspoon) who is the big favourite to win. Injured footballer Paul Meltzer (Chris Klein) is convinced to run by Jim so that Tracy has some competition and out of rejection from her female companion, who chooses Paul, Tammy (Jessica Campbell) also runs. The school becomes embroiled in underhand election tactics as well as questionable behaviour by some of the teachers.

Election does a great job of poking fun at the seriousness behind student elections and the people's perceptions of each other in school, where popularity is so important. It's a clever political satire with some touching moments of comedy usually at the expense of the characers, from the hapless Matthew Broderick to the far too eager Reese Witherspoon.

Jim McAllister (Matthew Broderick)

It's one of the early works of Alexander Payne but it has a lot of his hallmarks, the character comedy inter-filled with sweet moments and the desperation of people living almost dead-ends lives knowing that they aren't happy but not doing anything about it. The film hasn't dated brilliantly, like many other films from this era of the 90's, but still provides entertainment. For me, its like many of Payne's films in being enjoyable without completely blowing you away.

3/4 Smarter high school comedy than the average