The film is clearly trying to poke fun at the pretentiousness of "smart people" but it leaves its audiences wondering what has happened to all of the smart directors. Murro does a textbook job of splicing the endless scenes of awkward family interactions but he fails to create any coherent storyline. His film seems to have been made by a first year film student with loud, disconnected musical transitions from scene to scene.
The script is even further complicated by the haphazard placement of scenes which make the storyline itself almost incomprehensible and makes the love story, which should lead to the redemption of everyone involved, so completely ridiculous and farcical that it discredits the entire movie. Murro's biggest mistake is that he doesn't give his audience any credit. He assumes that if he doesn't beat us over the head with something, then we won't understand it-- a sentiment which results in endless scenes where Lawrence (Dennis Quaid) doesn't recognize his students. In one scene, Murro even frames Page's character, a Young Republican, in front of a picture of Ronald Reagan.
The weaknesses of the film are not entirely the fault of the director. Screenwriter, Mark Poirier has crafted a story that is not so much a story as it is clips from several other stories. He tries and fails to tell a story about high school survival, unexpected love and literary ambitions, even trying to wedge incest into the mess of a plot that he calls a movie. The kiss of death is that the film suffers an identity crisis, unable to decide whether the story is about the romance or the family. In the end, it ends up being about nothing at all except for shoddy film-making.
A lackluster script, predictable performances and uninspired, overwrought directing never add up to a success. Smart People is no exception.
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