Part of 1999 and Music City Mondays
The dazzling sophomore film from Wes Anderson is equal parts coming-of-age story, French New Wave homage, and screwball comedy. Tenth grader Max Fischer (Jason Schwartzman) is Rushmore Academy’s most extracurricular student — and its least scholarly. He faces expulsion and enters into unlikely friendships with both a lovely first-grade teacher (Olivia Williams) and a melancholy self-made millionaire (Bill Murray, in an award-winning performance). Set to a soundtrack of classic British Invasion tunes, RUSHMORE defies categorization, capturing the pain and exuberance of adolescence with wit, emotional depth and cinematic panache.
“A bittersweet tale about growing up, anchored by sensational turns from the cast and a pitch-perfect script.” —Cory Woodroof, USA Today “There's a danger of overselling Anderson's sweet-hearted, loony little fantasy, but everything — from the soundtrack of '60s Brit bands with their jangly anthems of angsty love to Robert Yeoman's slightly hyper-real photography — fits perfectly.” —Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer “There's a sweet humanity about the picture, though it's anything but sentimental.” —Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle
