Kids (1995) ★★★★☆

In the first minutes of screen time of the Larry Clark film Kids, the viewer is challenged by the actions taking place in front of them. Perhaps the most shocking thought racing through someone's mind is that this could be and likely is happening somewhere in America, in some city, some town, some place that has a loose restriction on access to excess. Filmed in New York City in the summer of 1994 and starring future successful actresses Chloe Sevigny and Rosario Dawson, kids is a look at a day in the life of multiple teenagers engaging in underage drug use and unprotected sex. The language is what grabs your right away and the coarse vocabulary regarding girls, boys, and the casual and somewhat obvious ignorant nature of sexual relationships. One boy in particular, Telly(Leo Fitzpatrick) is especially cavalier about "fucking bitches", Telly is 14. After deflowering a virgin to start the film, he brags to his friends that his plan is to deflower as many virgins as possible and so we follow him on his quest. We then visit a group of girls(including Sevigny and Dawson) who casually and openly talk about their sexual histories and experiences.

Following this group talk between the girls, we follow Dawson and Sevigny to a clinic so they can be tested for HIV. Coming out at the time that it did, AIDS was a really big deal at the time and something these kids were really dealing with when hitting sexual puberty. Jenny(Sevigny) tests positive for HIV. She has had sex with only one boy who we come to find is Telly, the boy who's vowed to sleep with as many virgins as possible. So now that we know how Telly is affecting his environment we see him meet girl after girl throughout the film, unaware of what he is doing. It's in this element that the film presents such a harrowing narrative, little demons let run amok not knowing what they do. As we follow Jenny, she effortlessly tries to track down Telly to let him know of the news that burdens her throughout the 2nd and 3rd act. Sevigny has a true vulnerability that really comes through and we understand her plight better than she does because of what we know.

Kids is energetically shot, the camera acting almost as a ghost who's drifting through the party scenes...watching the actions of undeveloped emotionally confused little people surrounded by the ever widening abyss. The film falls short because it only gives us surface insights into these people's lives, mostly not seeing their home life, scattered hangout with cigarettes and 40's...rolling a blunt in Washington Square park after dumping the tobacco to the asphalt. But that's the direction of these characters, all they have are the highs of the every day and it's all they care about even if it's at the expense of someone else. We see this mania reach it's peak at the end of the film where a soul crushing rape scene takes place and leaves you in that dark place that exists in your mind most people try not to go to. So there could of been more character substance, more of a directed plot but that's also staples of the independent film scene of the 1990's. Great art asks many more questions than it answers, and so that is what we're left with, a lot of questions.