Main Cast: Jürgen Prochnow, Elisabeth Rosen, Michael Belyea, Clint Howard, Elisabeth Moss
Release Year: 2003
Country: DE/CA
Run Time: 87 minutes
Plot
Uwe Boll's Heart of America: Homeroom is a drama about a massacre on the final day of the school year. The last day of school contains many problems for teachers and students alike. The principal must discipline an English teacher (Michael Paré) who has let his professional frustrations get the better of him, student Dara needs to score from the drug dealing Wex (G. Michael Gray), and a foursome of cruel athletes continues to torment the losers and nerds. Unbeknown to everyone else at the school, the eternally picked upon Daniel (Kett Turton) and Barry (Michael Belyea), as well as a third accomplice, are extensively armed and plan to unleash their fury on the school right after final bell. ~ Perry Seibert, All Movie Guide
Review
To many cult movie aficionados, the name Uwe Boll is synonymous with bad big-screen adaptations of video games. However, he has also tried to do more than just commercial schlock. Case in point: this film, which is a serious attempt to come to terms with the Columbine tragedy. Unfortunately, Heart Of America: Homeroom is every bit as trashy and unintentionally funny as his better known work. Boll is able to give the film a crisp, commercial look but is hopeless lost when it comes to its content: the depiction of high school life is ludicrously unconvincing, the sex and violence content is presented in a heavy-handed and exploitative style and the finale hinges on a high-concept plot twist that cheapens the sincerity of its attempts at delivering a social message. There are plenty of familiar names in the cast but they seem to have been thrown in at random and given little direction: the very German Jurgen Prochnow acquits himself as well as he can but is absurdly miscast as a middle-American school principal and Maria Conchita Alonso gives a stiff, totally lost performance as a guidance counselor. The teen actors fare better but do anonymous work that never really gets the viewer invested in their plights. In short, Heart Of America: Homeroom works better as a camp classic than it does as a serious drama. ~ Donald Guarisco, All Movie Guide
