Terry Zwigoff’s sharply funny comedy takes teenage discontent seriously without excusing its cruelty. Thora Birch and Steve Buscemi make the loneliness hurt, though the unhurried pace occasionally gives us too much time to appreciate the point.
Ghost World is a funny, uncomfortable film about the pleasure of deciding that everyone else is dreadful. Terry Zwigoff lets us enjoy that pleasure long enough to understand why Enid and Rebecca rely on it, then asks us to look again at the people they dismiss. We recommend it warmly, with a warning that its slow pace sometimes turns a good joke into a prolonged inspection. The girls’ intelligence makes them entertaining company even when their judgements are indefensible.
Thora Birch plays Enid as someone who has worked hard at being difficult and would struggle to stop. The contempt is funny because Birch gives it conviction: she never seems to be waiting for permission to say the unpleasant thing. Daniel Clowes and Zwigoff’s screenplay understands how shared dislikes can keep a friendship busy while leaving important questions untouched. With Scarlett Johansson’s Rebecca, the little contests over who gets to be right matter as much as the jokes. The writing lets us sense how tiring such a friendship might become.
Johansson deserves particular credit for making Rebecca more than an audience for Enid. There is a difference in the way the two young women carry their dissatisfaction, and neither performance explains it away for our convenience. When the girls are together, Johansson gives Rebecca enough resistance to keep Birch’s forcefulness from deciding the meaning of every exchange. The film’s attention to this unequal partnership is more persuasive than its broader complaints about suburbia.
Steve Buscemi’s Seymour complicates Enid’s belief that she can judge people at a glance. He is an older outsider, and Buscemi makes the discomfort of that position matter more than its comic usefulness. We were surprised by how sad we felt for him. His awkwardness looks exhausting to live with, and the performance makes us reluctant to enjoy the jokes at his expense. The connection between him and Enid gives Birch room to show curiosity beneath the practised disapproval.
Affonso Beato photographs the suburban surroundings with a neatness that makes their dreariness worse. Edward T. McAvoy’s production design gives ordinary places a slightly exaggerated, cartoon-like look, well suited to characters who see so much to object to. The care in these images helps us understand Enid’s impatience without requiring us to share every judgement. Zwigoff makes these places interesting to look at even when we can understand why the girls would rather be somewhere else.
The editing by Michael R. Miller and Carole Kravetz Aykanian allows the discomfort time to register, though some scenes keep going after it has registered quite sufficiently. At 111 minutes, the film has stretches where the dry delivery begins to feel too uniform. David Kitay’s music contributes to the sadness without making it oppressive. The larger reservation is Zwigoff’s tendency to linger over the drabness surrounding these people when the performers have already made their dissatisfaction clear.
Coming-of-age comedies often make being an outsider look rather comfortable. Ghost World allows Enid to be funny and perceptive without pretending that either quality makes her good at friendship. Its sympathy extends to people she has not bothered to understand, and that is where it becomes moving. Give it a quiet evening, when Buscemi’s hesitations will not have to compete with a conversation.
