‘High School Confidential’ rich in topics for parents and teens
Mar 17th, 2008 by Kathy
An eight-part documentary follows the lives of a dozen girls as they move from freshman through senior year in “High School Confidential.”
Source: http://signonsandiego.com/news/features/20080308…
By Jane Clifford
UNION-TRIBUNE FAMILY EDITOR
As Sharon Liese readied her daughter – and herself – for Justine’s transition to high school, the single mother looked unsuccessfully for resources to help them both through this passage. When she couldn’t find what she needed, she decided to make her own.
Monday, we meet Lauren G. and Cappie, short for Caprice.
In the beginning, they are talking about going to high school, what they expect. Both have a little of that deer-in-the-headlights look, but they smile through a mouthful of metal braces and say they’re ready.
Over the next hour, we watch as Lauren, a born dancer, tries out for the drill team. But she doesn’t make it. Though she’s a trouper, saying it’s OK, her parents tell us how upset she really was.
Cappie, too, is finding her way, as she must, to fit in with the other 1,200 students in the school that is in an upscale suburb of Kansas City.
The narrator tells us, as if any of us could ever forget, that social cliques, academic standing and athletic performance “define you” in high school.
Cappie goes out for volleyball in the spring of freshman year, makes the team, but quits to get a job at Dairy Queen, working three days a week for extra spending money.
Cappie’s parents, we learn, separated before she was born. Cappie’s biggest need, she confides to the camera, is for her dad’s involvement in her life. In a moving scene with a counselor, her eyes fill as she says, “You go over to your friends’ houses and they hug their dad … and you don’t have that.”
How much of a role does that play in her decision to become a party girl by junior year? It’s left for viewers to ponder.
Lauren’s luckier, growing up with both of her parents. She tries out and makes the drill team in her sophomore year. Then her luck runs out. A talk with her mom about her menstrual cycle leads to a visit to her doctor, where blood tests signal potentially bigger problems. After an MRI, she learns she has a brain tumor. It’s small and benign, but it takes over her life. Any small headache can send her spiraling out of control with fear and running for her mom’s bed.
We watch how Lauren’s family and friends support her as she heads toward junior year and surgery. The tumor is growing ever so slightly, but enough to prompt her doctor to want to get it out now.
Cappie, meanwhile, is watching her grades slide, and her friends’ support, at least on camera, is limited to making sure she has enough beer or booze to drink, and pot to smoke if she wants it.
“I don’t really drink too much, to the point of throwing up and passing out. That’s only happened twice,” she says, giggling.
“She dabbles in things I don’t care for,” her mother, Pamela, says, which will resonate with any parent who’s had teenagers: Cappie is becoming someone her mother doesn’t always recognize.
Lauren’s parents are worried that her surgery might leave her unable to recognize them.
She comes through and is philosophical. She never thought anything like this would happen to her, that her charmed life would just go on. And on. She speaks of a new appreciation for each day, heading for graduation with a maturity that comes from facing death.
Cappie comes through the fog and realizes she’s made some bad choices but seeks redemption. No longer a party animal, she moves away from longtime boyfriend Sean and closer to her best friend’s ex. That causes both boyfriend and best friend to shun Cappie. And since they’re all friends with the same people …
“I don’t have any friends,” Cappie says, blinking back tears. She’s sad but doesn’t regret the new relationship. She’s just anxious to move on, be done with high school and its drama.
You’re left with the feeling that these two girls from the Class of 2006 will make it. Their strength is underscored by the soundtrack, a song called “Imperfection,” by Saving Jane:
This is what you get,
this is who I am …
Sometimes I trip and fall
But I know where I stand.
If you’re thinking about changing my direction,
Don’t mess with imperfection.
Unfortunately, Liese spent too much time on Lauren’s illness, as defining a moment as that was for her and her family, and not enough on letting us hear how that illness affected her love life, her friendships, her academic performance.
Yes, only so much can be covered in an hour, even focusing on only two girls at a time. But knowing that she spent four years working on this, I want 80 episodes, 800 episodes, not eight.
Still, though volumes go unspoken, the value of the program is going to be what is spoken – between parents and their daughters who are watching at home.
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