Les taudis de Beverly Hills

i'm not quite sure exactly why i like this film but as the credits rolled i was smiling nonetheless. the orange/brown/pea-soup green 70's setting of it was one of the things i found authentic and quirky about it. the whole texture of the movies seems saturated by that awful color scheme, as though the whole world is being invaded and lorded over by kitsch. another more base reason is the infinitely watchable natasha lyonne as the blossomed teenager coping with an increasingly unstable world. first her family life and now even her body seem to follow wild and unpredictable spurts. she is obviously quite attractive and i would say the best actor/actress to come out of the American pie bunch and thus not surprisingly the most overlooked. the characters all seem believable to the point that one has to understand that some biographical elements are playing heavily into the story. that said brings to mind the old adage that truth is often stranger than fiction, and in this case it also is more entertaining.

7 out of 10