High school is a perfect setting for noir but Assassination of a High School President downplays the genre to instead focus on the high school aspect of the premise. Instead of getting Bobby Funke acting like a hard boiled detective out to wade through an engrossing web of lies and deceit to solve a mystery we get a nerdy kid trying to get a summer internship and gets to fit in with the cool crowd. The failure of the film rests solely on rejecting the noir aesthetic and instead doing scenes with school dances and beer pong. Visually many of the noir staples are missing with no use of shadows, pedestrian use of lightening and no camera angles. Noir is treated as nothing more than a plot device. Without high stakes it is quite hard to really become engrossed with the plot. Hanging in the balance is a summer internship that Bobby never seems to really care too much about and as a result it is hard to get worked up about the plot.
Reece Thompson does a decent job as Bobby Funke, any problems with the character are issues with the writing and not with the performance. There is a huge cast of characters and honestly most serve no purpose but to further the plot. There is no depth and doesn't even make very good use of high school stereotypes. The one that missed the mark the most is the principal played by Bruce Willis. He exists as the authority figure but is way over the top and is a one note joke as an ex-soldier who is overly aggressive and keeps taking about his fighting experiences. The less said about Mischa Barton's weak attempt to play a femme fatale the better. A brief nude scene does not excuse this performance. An interesting premise ruined by poor writing and direction. If you have any interest in this film at all seek out Brick, a film with a similar premise that succeeds in all ways where this film failed and is the far superior one for it.
Reece Thompson does a decent job as Bobby Funke, any problems with the character are issues with the writing and not with the performance. There is a huge cast of characters and honestly most serve no purpose but to further the plot. There is no depth and doesn't even make very good use of high school stereotypes. The one that missed the mark the most is the principal played by Bruce Willis. He exists as the authority figure but is way over the top and is a one note joke as an ex-soldier who is overly aggressive and keeps taking about his fighting experiences. The less said about Mischa Barton's weak attempt to play a femme fatale the better. A brief nude scene does not excuse this performance. An interesting premise ruined by poor writing and direction. If you have any interest in this film at all seek out Brick, a film with a similar premise that succeeds in all ways where this film failed and is the far superior one for it.