Big things come in small packages, so they say, and it's especially true when discovering a little '90s indie film -- a critics darling in its heyday, a surprising box office take, and small award winner -- and being shocked at the fact that its pretty underrated in today's movie obsessed culture of "gems" and "cult classics" alike. It's even more of a shocker that the film's lead star is rarely seen or even appreciated these days (just check out her IMdB message board...) after her name was on the tongue of most in the indie film circuit at the time. I'm talkin' about the underrated quirky, awkwardness most assuredly given life by...
The film cleverly handles each of these brutal incidents so that they register in ways that are both hilarious and heartbreaking, and almost always at the same time. It's as if the harsh, raw brutality becomes so stressful and overwhelming for Dawn that everything for the audience just snaps in way that it's so sad that it becomes so funny.
Welcome to the Dollhouse doesn't so much have a straightforward "plot", but rather a series of episodic events, that (somehow all cohere beautifully) and play out with Dawn right at the dead center as it all (tragically) unfolds. One of the few main narrative threads involves Dawn's infatuation and near obsession with her brother's band mate Steve Rogers; a horny, douche-y high school badass who (like everyone else) doesn't seem to appreciate or even notice Dawn's attention.
Despite the fact that Dawn's oblivious to this fact makes everything all the more sad/funny. In Steve, Dawn hopes to find someone who will rescue her from this life and give her everything she never had, and Matarazzo conveys Dawn's glimmer of hope that maybe she actually can escape from everything. On the outside, Dawn might be the gawky, unappealing little girl with horrible fashion sense, but with her interior, Matarazzo suggests that Dawn is a bit more vaguely aware and smarter than anyone would think.
And although she has the brains, she almost never relies on them but instead goes with what feels right, then what she knows is right. This is most pungent in the story line which involves Dawn's odd, love-hate relationship with the meanest school bully, Brandon McCarthy. He teases her and viciously attacks her both verbally and physically yet it's all done out of a sort of special connection they have. What at first was a scary distance, slowly becomes a mutual friendship between these two. She understands what's happening. She (as well as the audience) gets that Brandon is the only other human in her world of in-humane cartoons, so she goes with her emotions and their relationship becomes the heart of the film.
Their scenes together are easily the film's most emotionally engaging and even though the clarity is present, the film and Matarazzo hold something back which makes everything all the more compelling. But things get messy again, when both Brandon and Steve express there disdain for Dawn and everything is sent on a downward spiral for our tragic hero.
What I find so impressive about Matarazzo's work is that she can generate so many detailed complexities of Dawn's psyche without making her this overblown, mechanical cipher; she's always a child that maintains an odd kind of simplicity. Many other young actress' would have missed these details completely and it would have resulted in a very dull, vaccum within the narrative.
But going back to Dawn's "smarts", I found that each incident drives Dawn further into a darker, feral territory, and Matarazzo conveys that Dawn is at every minute absorbing everything and it shows in her actions. Particularly her on-the-spot idea of having Missy disappear and the emotional damage she knows it will cause as a means of revenge. Matarazzo's Dawn has a dark intelligence and determination, and neither the film, nor the actress blame Dawn for her intentional misdoings. Both sympathize with her, and really how can't you?
And this emotional sympathy becomes even more overwhelming in the closing scenes, and a big part of it is due to the Matarazzo. Even though Dawn may act and think "in the moment", Matarazzo's performance is marked by a steady consistency and confidence during and between nearly every scene.
Within this perfect, hilarious, and emotionally resonant film, Heather Matarazzo crafts a deeply complex, haunting, and even funny portrait of luminous humanity shining through from the tragic soul of Dawn Wiener.
Heather Matarazzo plays Dawn Wiener, the miserably dorky middle-schooler living in a harsh, insensitive adolescent nightmare.
Marked with a hilariously awful last name is one of the least of her problems when she is enduring a lifetime of depression, boredom, and confusion rigidly packaged together. At school she is tormented by her peers, being called "dog face", "lesbo" and "wienerdog" and is subjected to mental, almost psychologically degrading incidents (I'm lookin' at you Lolita!) that lowers her already flat self-esteem.
Dawn's homelife is just as bad when she has to live with two uncaring and unsuspecting parents, a dorky self-absorbed brother, and a little twit of a sister with whom her parents' true love and devotion lies with. With no attention, affection, or warmth even close to touching her, Dawn is lost amid a scary and cold world where it seems truly impossible to live and breathe, especially with these detailed caricatures staring here down every which way.
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