crazy/beautiful

REVIEW
A wealthy but mixed-up girl (an effective-as-usual Dunst) and a Latino boy (an equally good Hernandez) from the wrong side of the tracks meet cute and fall in love. Unfortunately, her erratic behavior and psychological problems threaten to crush his dream of becoming a Navy pilot. An engaging teen film, crazy/beautiful is a breath of fresh air after the countless moronic comedies of the past few years aimed at high schoolers. While one wishes writer-director Stockwell had gone dramatically further with these characters (and apparently his studio-nixed director's cut did so), this is still stronger than the vast majority of teen films. Davison is quite good as Dunst's congressman father, who is surprisingly as concerned with Hernandez's future (and Dunst's negative impact on it) as he is his own daughter's.