Pumpkin is a 2002 film starring Christina Ricci. It is a dark comedy and story of forbidden love between a developmentally handicapped man (Hank Harris) and a sorority girl (Ricci). The film was directed by Anthony Abrams and Adam Larson Broder and written by Adam Larson Broder.
Plot
Carolyn McDuffy, in an effort to help her sorority sisters win a coveted award that has eluded them in the past years, joins them in training some handicapped young adults for Challenged Games - a fictional analogy to the Special Olympics. Carolyn is linked with Pumpkin Romanoff and is horrified, mostly because she has never been in such an environment. Pumpkin is kind towards her and soon she finds herself falling in love with him because he is genuine, unlike her sorority sisters and her boyfriend.
Everyone hates the idea of Carolyn being in love with this "retard", including Pumpkin's own mother, despite the fact that Carolyn's love has inspired Pumpkin to get out of his wheelchair and become the best athlete on the team. In one of the climactic scenes, Pumpkin's mother walks into her son's room and discovers that Carolyn and Pumpkin have been sexually involved. Pumpkin's mother accuses her of raping her son and says he has no idea what she has done to him. She calls Carolyn's school and Carolyn is kicked out of school and the sorority. In a tense scene, she drinks a bunch of medicine in her cabinet in an attempt to commit suicide, but finds out that she has merely drunk saline solution from a contact lens cleaning bottle and Pepto Bismol and suffers no ill effects.
Strings are pulled since Kent and Carolyn are the perfect couple and would ensure the sorority winning the award, and Carolyn is let back into school, as well as the sorority, and her boyfriend Kent takes her back.
It all comes to a climax at the sorority's ball, where Pumpkin and his friends crash the party so Pumpkin can dance with the woman he loves. Kent won't stand for it, being that he is a tennis jock being dumped for a "retard". He punches Pumpkin repeatedly as the girls are holding Carolyn and keeping Pumpkin's friends at bay. He turns his back as Pumpkin gathers his wits. Pumpkin charges Kent, bearhugs him, and drops him, knocking him out for a few seconds, leaving everyone stunned, including Pumpkin. Kent gets up, looks around and runs off crying. Carolyn tries to take Pumpkin inside to the dance, but the sorority sisters won't let them in. Carolyn pushes her way through with Pumpkin and they dance alone. Soon, others start to see the love between them and join them on the dance floor.
As they're dancing, Kent is shown driving erratically and sobbing hysterically. He swerves to avoid a truck and plunges off the cliff. The car explodes in midair and crashes to the bottom of the cliff. Carolyn goes to the hospital to check on Kent and finds that he is now paraplegic, though not burned from the explosion. He blames Carolyn for his problems and she is left distraught. She quits school, the sorority, and swears off Pumpkin forever. The sorority stops helping the team and the rival sorority wins the award.
Carolyn is at a public university and opens up to her peers. They encourage her to go for what she wants. The sorority sisters have a change of heart and show up at the Olympic event. Kent is now the coach for Pumpkin's team and has become a motivator and humble person. The race is down to Pumpkin and his rival, a big bully who berates Pumpkin at every chance given.
Pumpkin is motivated by Kent, telling him to win it for Carolyn and saying she wouldn't want him to lose. As he's running, he sees Carolyn in the stands and gets a sudden boost of energy. Pumpkin wins the race and at the finish line he is congratulated by the sorority sisters, his mother and Kent. Carolyn comes down to see Pumpkin as his mother is hugging him. She endears him to Carolyn, finally accepting her son's progress into a man. Carolyn and Pumpkin walk off together. She asks him what name she should call him, and he replies "Pumpkin will be fine." She then asks if he meant his previous question about the moon literally or metaphorically, to which he replies "What?" Carolyn turns around and looks back for a second with a concerned expression and then continues walking with Pumpkin.
Cast
Critical reception and box office success
Pumpkin received mixed reviews from critics. 27 of 43 reviews compiled by Rotten Tomatoes were negative, resulting in a "Tomatometer" score of 39%.[1] At Metacritic, the film received a metascore of 46% based on 24 reviews.
One of the most positive reviews was by Roger Ebert for the Chicago Sun-Times; he wrote, "[Pumpkin] is alive, and takes chances, and uses the wicked blade of satire in order to show up the complacent political correctness of other movies in its campus genre." Michael O'Sullivan of the Washington Post also approved of the film, calling it "an odd and oddly endearing romantic black comedy." On the other end of the spectrum, Todd McCarthy of Variety wrote that the film "gets along on curiosity value for a while, but becomes increasingly unconvincing and ludicrous as it staggers endlessly toward the finish line."[2]
Pumpkin opened in American theatres on June 28, 2002 in a limited release. It grossed $30,514 in eight theatres in its first weekend, with a per-screen-average of $3,814. The film expanded to 19 theatres the following weekend, but its theatre count declined from there. Pumpkin completed its theatrical run four months later with a final gross of $308,552.[3]
Since the film has been released on DVD, it has acquired a cult following.[4] Ricci herself has called it "a great movie" [5] and many sites recognize the film as "one of the most underrated films of the decade."[6]
References
External links
