Barnes & Noble

Unappreciated at the box office, Rushmore is nevertheless a poignant comedy that deals with heartbreak, cross-generational friendship, class, ambition, and emotional resurrection -- not to mention the variegated ways to say and mean a word like "handjob." The plot traces four months in the life of Max Fischer (Jason Schwartzman), a high school sophomore on a scholarship to Rushmore Academy, where he is both the most prolific club-founder and worst student. Over the course of a few days in September, he befriends a steel tycoon, Herman Blume (Bill Murray), and a fourth-grade teacher, Ms. Cross (Olivia Williams). Smitten with Ms. Cross, he illegally builds an aquarium dedicated to her -- a project that gets him expelled from the academy. Adding insult to injury, he also discovers Cross and Blume have taken up with each other, and so November is marked by his forlorn withdrawal from the world. By December, he has bounced back with a new play, based on his pain and parts of his friends' lives, delivering Heaven and Hell, one of the greatest school dramas known to mankind. Rushmore is Wes Anderson's follow-up to his immensely likeable debut, Bottle Rocket, and establishes the director as an equal in the deep-dish comedy realm of Stanley Kubrick (Dr. Strangelove: Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb) and Hal Ashby (Harold and Maude). Overall, the deluxe DVD packaging and amusing extras go a long way to carving out Rushmore's place as the warm, rich piece of comic poetry it is.

All Movie Guide

After the highly acclaimed independent film Bottle Rocket, director Wes Anderson followed up with a quirky Touchstone Studios film entitled Rushmore. Written by Anderson and friend Owen Wilson (an actor in Armageddon and Anaconda), they created the story of Max Fischer, a highly eccentric 15-year-old boy who attends the tenth grade at Rushmore Academy. Played by Jason Schwartzman (Talia Shire's son and Francis Ford Coppola's nephew), Max is a poor student with big dreams and a love of extracurricular activities. Max is editor of the school newspaper and yearbook, president of the chess, astronomy, French, and German clubs, captain of the fencing team, and director of the school play. Max is also a compulsive liar, telling everyone that his barber father (Seymour Cassel) is really a brain surgeon. Suddenly Max falls in love with Miss Cross (Olivia Williams), a first-grade teacher at the school. He also makes a new friend in business tycoon Mr. Blume (Bill Murray), an eccentric millionaire who also loves Miss Cross. The love triangle heats up as Max refuses to believe that his age has anything to do with Miss Cross refusing his romantic advances. Also Max's scheme to erect an aquarium on the school baseball diamond gets him booted out of Rushmore Academy. As his life crumbles around him, he is forced to grow up and accept the consequences of his actions and his lies. He throws himself more into his extracurricular activities, hoping to redeem himself by staging the most ambitious school play ever attempted. Arthur Borman

Product Details

• UPC: 717951002983
• Source: WALT DISNEY VIDEO
• Region Code: 1
• Aspect Ratio: Cinemascope (2.35:1)
• Presentation: Wide Screen
• Sound: Dolby Digital, stereo
• Language: English
• Subtitles: English
• Time: 1:33:00
• Sales Rank: 2,632

Features:

DVD MENU