The Fallout, Megan Park (6/10)

The Fallout is a movie that came out last year that deals with the aftermath of a high school shooting. It follows Vada as some of her relationships suffer and other relationships grow out of the trauma. All I really knew about it going in was that it was gay and dealt with a school shooting and got a pretty good critical reception. On the positive side, I think that the writing (dialogue) was really well done. It took a nuanced look at social media, drugs, and just young life in 2022. It did not make the gay thing too deep or a central part of Vada's character, and it was so fucking accurate in its depictions of a generation that is obsessed with Tiktok and slime and Instagram, but also is generally more progressive politically and sexually. And parts of the writing were really funny; I definitely laughed out loud a couple times and felt really tender and sad at other parts. Very little in the movie felt cheesy which would have been an easy trap to fall into - see the movie Crush lmao. Anyways, my main critique was that there was very little resolution. There was such intent and nuance that went into the character development/construction of Vada's whole life, but the ending felt really abrupt and there was a lot left unresolved. And it didn't need like overly clean happy cheery resolution, but just a resolution. I won't spoil, but the ending was definitely intentional to make a point about the prevalence of school shootings especially for an American audience that has become callous and accustomed... but still, especially because the movie was only 1hr32 min, I think it would have greatly benefited from 15 extra minutes of plot resolution while still having the same politically motivating effect. Overall, I think my expectations were exceeded by how thoughtfully the movie and characters were crafted, but I was definitely disappointed by the ending. Oh and on another note, I also enjoyed that the protagonist was not white (or half white) because I think the movie could have very easily fallen prey to all-white suburbian nonsense.