I had serious suspicions about the quality of film Spring Breakers but based on the user rating this movie had on IMDb and especially on its Metacritic score I took the risk and decided to see it. Well, it was a huge mistake. And while I can see where its average user rating could come from, I am completely confused in regard to its Metacritic rating. Usually critics do not vote so high for a boring mess like this. Yes, Spring Breakers is boring. It is far too long for the quantity of content it presents. Thus it is also repetitive and annoying. The camera work is not less annoying either. The movie lacks any substantial plot. The characters are forgettable, it's hard even to remember their names throughout the movie, and some of the main characters (if not all of them?) are redundant. Why anyone who considers themselves knowledgeable about films would like this movie is beyond my understanding even if we label Harmony Korine's Spring Breakers a piece of art just for the sake of it.
Spring Breakers is about four college girls (Vanessa Hudgens, Ashley Benson, Rachel Korine and Selena Gomez) who long for a spring break vacation. They do not have enough money so three of them decide to rob a restaurant in order to fund their adventure. The job is done and soon they are on the desired vacation. After having some intensive "fun" they quickly land in jail. A local criminal (James Franco) bails them out of the trouble and hopes to get something in return. From then on the mess becomes even bigger and the boredom unbearable.
Having in mind the cast listed above, it's normal to not expect acting miracles from the actors. Add lack of a decent screenplay and performances are totally doomed. All of the girls behave inadequately to what they say and there is not a single character in the movie that demonstrates any integrity. I can understand if there are many viewers, which "like" the film only because of Selena Gomez or the rest of its attractive cast. What is hard to understand though is why the critique has not been harsher.
If this movie was released several decades ago it could be labelled audacious (like MASH, for example). Now it is not. The same is valid for the camera shots. I wouldn't call them innovative. They're just irritating. Selena Gomez's character is hardly in place in this movie and one can wonder why she's in it. The film is full of random events and random monologues, which I do not feel to be helpful at all. And in addition to the awfulness of the content, the amount of substance is so limited that it could work as a short film (perhaps?) but as a feature film it is just plain tedious.
Labelling Spring Breakers "art" do not help either to appreciate the movie (at least it does not help me). I can call the film ambitious at best but this does not make it entertaining or brave. Seeing some mediocre movies is tolerable when someone has nothing better to do but it is hardly the case with this Harmony Korine's film. My humble recommendation is to avoid it at all costs if you are not among those people who have the special talent to enjoy something just because it is different.
