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Director Terry Zwigoff’s bitingly humorous Ghost World successfully nails several brands of droll despair with its lustrous lull and gloom. Written by Zwigoff and Daniel Clowes, author of the same-named comic-book serial, Ghost World is a loving look at the growing pains of two eccentric young women, told in an almost bluesy tempo. The movie starts with the bonding of best friends Enid (Thora Birch) and Rebecca (Scarlett Johansson); flipping the bird at their high school on graduation day, they've also decided not to attend college, keeping with Enid's goal of defying "definition." Before the workaday grind begins to close in on them, the girls are a deadpan Laurel and Hardy, getting involved in a series of incidents that express their bleak, defensive humor: tailing suspected Satanists; prank-calling personal-ad writers; needling customers at a '50s-retro diner called Wowsville; and taunting an inert store clerk (Brad Renfro) whom they both secretly fancy. Rebecca's decision to look for an apartment in a "totally normal" neighborhood begins a separation process, as Enid responds by dyeing her hair green and dressing punk for a day. Enid's emotional currents shift as often as her spectacles, which she changes from scene to scene -- cat eyes, wire rims, and squarish black frames. Her room, a colorful enclave with goldenrod shelves packed with vintage pop ephemera, becomes her retreat. Ghost World evolves into a funny, un-romance between Enid and bug-eyed, stooping record collector Seymour (Steve Buscemi), but it resists the impulse to resolve Enid's issues in a tidy Hollywood fashion. The first fiction effort by Zwigoff -- whose celebrated Crumb also savored eccentricity, specifically that of comic-book legend R. Crumb and his kin -- fires potent salvos against strip-mall America while serving as an apt measuring of teen ennui. Although cast in a color palette and more cinematically structured than Clowes's comics, the film preserves the characters' funk, regarding this rich gallery of creeps, weirdos, and loners with essential sympathy. The DVD edition sports the infectious, dizzying shimmyfest "Jaan Pehechaan Ho," from the Bollywood film Gumnaam (1965), a frenzied dance number that -- even as a clip -- is an incredible movie. Eddy Crouse

All Movie Guide

Filmmaker Terry Zwigoff, who enjoyed breakthrough success with his 1994 documentary Crumb, shifts gears as he examines the lives of two young women on the verge of leaving their adolescence behind in his first dramatic feature. Enid (Thora Birch) and Rebecca (Scarlett Johansson) are two close friends who've just graduated from high school, and are trying to decide what to do with their lives. Enid is a dark-haired arch cynic who is tired of living at home with her ineffectual dad (Bob Balaban) and his annoyingly perky girlfriend Maxine (Teri Garr), while Rebecca is prettier and a bit cheerier, but no more certain about her future. While the two girls have vague plans of getting an apartment together, they seem content to while away their summer hanging out and indulging in their shared infatuation with Josh (Brad Renfro), a friend from school who works at a convenience store and doesn't seem to be especially attracted to either of them. Enid discovers that in order to get her diploma, she'll have to take an additional class over the summer, where she winds up studying art with Roberta (Illeana Douglas), who is determined to encourage Enid's creative impulses, whether Enid likes it or not. More significantly, Enid meets Seymour (Steve Buscemi), a geeky record collector more than twice her age, and while they would seem to have little in common (and Rebecca thinks he's a creep), Enid discovers a kindred spirit in fellow misfit Seymour, who shares her disgust with the world around them, and a relationship begins to develop between the two. Ghost World is based on the award-winning graphic novel by comic artist Daniel Clowes, who also wrote the film's screenplay. Mark Deming

Village Voice

Keep your Lara Croft and your Shrek.For me, the summer's reigning icons are Enid, Thora Birch's geek goddess in Ghost World, and her action-movie analogue. J. Hoberman

New York Times

It's surely the best depiction of teenage eccentricity since Rushmore, and its incisive satire of the boredom and conformity that rule our thrill-seeking, individualistic land, and also its question-mark ending, reminded me of The Graduate. A.O. Scott

Chicago Sun-Times

I wanted to hug this movie. It takes such a risky journey and never steps wrong. It creates specific, original, believable, lovable characters, and meanders with them through their inconsolable days, never losing its sense of humor. Roger Ebert

Chicago Reader

If, like me, you've been wondering how Terry Zwigoff, the brilliant documentary filmmaker who made Crumb, would negotiate his shift to fiction filmmaking, here's your answer: brilliantly. Jonathan Rosenbaum

Product Details

• UPC: 027616867650
• Source: MGM (VIDEO & DVD)
• Region Code: 1
• Aspect Ratio: Theatre Wide-Screen (1.85.1)
• Presentation: Wide Screen
• Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround
• Language: English
• Subtitles: English, Français, Español
• Time: 1:51:00
• Sales Rank: 26,061

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