Mean Creek | Review
Synopsis: When a group of teenage boys and one bold young girl seek playful revenge on the kid who has tormented them, nothing turns out the way they expected. What begins as a trip down a river and a childish prank soon turns into an eye-opening encounter with the enemy — a harrowing journey into wilderness and an event that will force them to grapple with the very meaning of friendship and responsibility.
Review: ‘Mean Creek’ is one of the most realistic depictions of teenage lives I’ve seen as of yet. The characters are realistic and believable, the dialogue is realistic and believable, and the situation the cast faces is realistic and believable.
George Tooney (Josh Peck) is a school bully who has been beating up and harassing Sam Merric (Rory Culkin) for a while. Sam’s older brother, Rocky (Travor Morgan), and Rocky’s two friends, Marty (Scott Mechlowicz) and Clyde (Ryan Kelley), scheme up a plan to get back at George for bullying Sam. The plan is simple: invite George to a boating trip for Sam’s fake birthday, strip George naked, throw him into the water, and have him walk all the way home naked. The entire gang is in on the plan. However, when Sam’s girlfriend, Millie (Carly Schroeder), who’s also going on the trip, finds out about the prank, she forces Sam to call it off, thinking it’s not a good idea. Eventually the entire group knows the prank’s been called off. However, the whole group, including George, are still on the boat sailing through the creek. Marty, the leader of the group, soon decides to anchor the boat and have everyone play a game of Truth-or-Dare. This Truth-or-Dare sequence is what soon causes the troubles the gang will face.
Throughout the entire film, not just the Truth-or-Dare scene, the themes of misunderstanding and peer-pressure are examined. The entire group, aside from Marty, realize that George isn’t all that bad of a kid during the boating trip, and that George just has internal problems. George is peer-pressured into smoking and doing some other small things during the boating trip (although they weren’t technically forced upon him). After the accident, the group is peer-pressured by Marty to keep everything a secret. All of the themes presented in ‘Mean Creek’ and the way they’re brought out are extremely realistic.
We learn about each of the characters’ background in ‘Mean Creek.’ Many of these characters have family issues and pasts that they don’t want to talk about. The film shows us how us teenagers talk to one another in real life, without knowing that we may be offending one another a lot. We learn from the film that you need to be careful about what you say and what you do. Marty constantly harasses Clyde about his gay parents. George constantly harasses every single member of the gang during the boating trip, though we know he’s just playing around. However, George’s insults soon go too far, which sets off the main conflict of the movie.
I like how the film is so realistic in its depiction of teenagers and bullying and ways of dealing with conflict. The gang’s reaction and aftermath of the events at the creek are very realistic as well. From viewing the trailer, I expected that the majority of the film would take place after the events of the boating trip. However, the majority of the film takes place before the boating trip and during the boating trip. The aftermath of the boating trip is more like an epilogue. I didn’t like this at first, since I expected the film would delve deeper into the conflict, but I soon realized that it’s a good thing. Since the majority of the film takes place before and during the boating trip, we learn more about George. We start to like him and his human side. Josh Peck does a great job at depicting George as a jerk, while at the same time, depicting him as a likable guy. The film’s kind of short to me, and the ending kind of just ends, but it’s not a bad ending. I surely think the ending could’ve been better, but it’s okay enough for me. I think anyone would like this film, especially teenagers.