Film Review: Tadpole (2002)

Despite all the modern dogmas about gender equality, gender being fluid or not existing at all, gender differences remain as the fact of life that plays important, if not decisive, role in many human endeavours. One example can be found in Tadpole, 2002 romantic comedy directed by Gary Winick, which would have been impossible to make if certain characters had their genders reversed.

Protagonist of the film is Oscar Grubman (played by Aaron Stanford), 15-year old boy who leaves his elite prep school for Thanksgiving in order to spend time with in New York City with his father Stanley (played by John Ritter), history professor at Columbia University. Oscar is well-read, eloquent and charming teenager whom some of his female peers, like Miranda Spear (played by Kate Mara), find attractive. He, however, discards their romantic advances because he finds them shallow and immature and, more importantly, because he has secretly developed crush towards his own stepmother, cardiologist Eve (played by Sigourney Weaver). His attempts to confess his feelings, however, fail, and Oscar tries to drown sorrow by faking his true age and getting drunk in the bar. This is condition in which he is found by Eve’s best friend, chiropractor Diane (played by Bebe Neuwirth) who brings Oscar home and has sex with him. When he wakes up, Oscar becomes worried that Diane might tell about their tryst to Eve and thus permanently ruin relationship with his stepmother.

Tadpole is one of those film critics, especially those of more snobbish persuasion, like. It was made with low budget, shot on digital video and it further validated its non-mainstream credentials by being unusually short with only about 75 minutes of running time. While Winick’s style of direction at times tries too hard to advertise its independent cinema roots, the script by Heather McGowan and Niels Mueller compensates this with very intelligent dialogue and well-written characters that seem like they could have belonged to New York upper middle class milieu this film portrays. This thoughtful approach compensates for Tadpole not being too funny or too attractive. Great credit for its success should go to the cast, which seems unusually high profile for this sort of films. Veterans like Sigourney Weaver, John Ritter and Bebe Neuwirth are overshadowed by Aaron Stanford, a relatively young actor who would later become known as the star of 12 Monkeys television series. Although obviously adult, he did a very good job of playing character a decade younger than his true age and who, in his own way, tries to give impression of being much older. Tadpole is simple and mostly entertaining little film that could be recommended to most audience, except those who, like Roger Ebert when reviewing it, start wondering what could have happened if someone tried to make film about 15-year old girl falling in love with her stepfather.

RATING: 6/10 (++)

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