DATE REVIEWED: 7/9/23
TITLE: Prom
BOX OFFICE RATED: PG (This is not suitable for GOD’s children.)
PRODUCTION YEAR: 2011 Walt Disney Pictures / Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures
RATING [1 LEAST FAVORITE TO 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED]: 1
REASON: This movie takes place in Michigan and centered on the Brookside High community, mostly the seniors and the Starry Night high school prom that was three weeks away. The students believed that prom was the one night when everyone was brought together to hang out even though they were divided during the previous four years, and on this one “prom” night…nobody cared about anybody’s social class status or who was who. High Honors student Nova Prescott was in charge of getting the decorations ready and set up the voting system for king and queen. Nova hoped her crush, Brandon Roberts, would ask her out to prom…but he didn’t. Nova found a dress in a magazine that Rachel, a girl with blue and green streaked hair as well as a lip and nose piercing, wanted to wear to prom and Nova gave it to her. Lloyd Taylor didn’t plan to go to prom and told his stepsister, Tess, that prom was like the Olympics of high school because you waited four years for it, three people had a good time, and everybody else got to live on with shattered dreams. Two sophomore boys, Lucas Arnaz and Corey Doyle, spotted younger sophomore girls standing around hoping to be asked to prom by seniors, and they discussed how they had nothing to offer the girls because they had no cars, no cool parties, and no prom. A problematic student Jesse Richter sat outside Principal Bill Dunnan’s office with Nova, and Jesse told Rhoda Wainwright the detention teacher that he just turned eighteen and asked her if she knew what that meant (they could date), and teacher Rhoda replied that it meant they could try Jesse as an adult. He asked Nova if she was in for trouble at the model UN, prom poster crisis or receiving an award for having the most awards. Nova replied that they caught her riding around school grounds on her little moped, and Jesse corrected her that it wasn’t a moped, and that he had a 1972 Norton Commando. Principal Dunnan told Jesse to get into his office now and told Nova he would have her paperwork soon. Principal Dunnan lectured Jesse for cutting too many classes and fighting too much in the cafeteria, and the principal told the student that he was going nowhere in life. Principal Dunnan stated that the really good news in the situation was that he was going on summer vacation in a month and half and Jesse would disappear forever. Jesse responded that he would finish his last six weeks with the school in one piece, and his bonus was that he knew Principal Dunnan would be right back there behind his desk having to deal with troubled kids all over again in the fall after his summer vacation. Jordan Lundley and her boyfriend, Tyler Barso, had a private conversation because she found an earring that didn’t belong to her in Tyler’s vehicle. Tyler said he drove half the girls’ soccer team to Papa Gino’s last week and told Jordan to stop acting crazy because he was going to be king and she would be his queen (prom). Nova thanked her friends Ali Gomez, Mei Kwan, Rolo and Brandon for their help in putting up the décor, and she gave them each two free tickets to the prom. Rolo told Ali that he was going to take Athena, his Greek-Canadian girlfriend, to prom. Mei told Nova that she didn’t yet tell her boyfriend, Justin Wexler, that she wasn’t going to Michigan University but planned on going to Parsons School of Design in New York. Over the next couple of weeks at school, students found clever ways to ask each other to the prom, and when they agreed they starting kissing on school property. One student had the male varsity team members write the prom letters on their bare chests, and another student, Darrel, interrupted detention class to ask a girl out and had the teacher running down the hall after Darrel who ran away from the teacher and wouldn’t stop running in the hall when told. Brandon asked Nova to carpool with him to prom because they needed to arrive early to make sure everything went smoothly, and he gave her one of the tickets back, which confused Nova and she was wasn’t sure if Brandon just asked her out to prom or not even after he said it was a date. Jesse’s mom, Sandra, came home early from her waitress job at Le Roy’s diner to surprise Jesse and his seven-year-old brother, Charlie, and told him that she wanted to spend some time with them since it was dead at work. Jesse said he was going to go to work and pick up some extra hours since now he didn’t have to watch Charlie. He walked right by his graduation cap and gown that came in the mail and didn’t want to try it on, and then he complained about the basement door being open because he didn’t want to think about what was on the other side of the door that he called garbage (his estranged dad’s things). At Nova’s house, she helped her mechanic dad, Frank, set up his computer so when she was in Georgetown in the fall on her scholarship, they could communicate with each other via Facetime/Skype. When Tyler asked Jordan to prom, he set up a Taco King candlelit dinner inside the school’s shed on school property that held the prom decorations. The shed was engulfed in flames and completely destroyed after the teen couple left because careless Tyler left the candles lit. The next morning, Nova told the prom committee that she wasn’t canceling prom otherwise the terrorists would win, and they still had three weeks to fix the decorations. However, the prom committee announced that they couldn’t help Nova rebuild because they all had other commitments such as exam studying throughout the end of the school year. Nova asked Principal Dunnan what they were going to do about the destroyed decorations. Jesse drove up on his motorcycle and told the principal that driving in the back part of the school grounds might damage school property as he stared at the burned-down shed in front of him. Jesse added sarcastically with a straight face…oh no, prom was ruined and the boys and girls of Brookside had been robbed of their right to stand around in a gym and drink punch, and Jesse told Principal Dunnan to put the flags at half-mast. Principal Dunnan decided on the spot that Jesse’s punishment was to help Nova rebuild the destroyed decorations, and if the prom wasn’t rebuilt to Nova’s specifications, then Principal Dunnan wouldn’t let Jesse graduate. Lloyd thanked Mei, sitting next to Justin, for being Oprah by offering a nugget of wisdom when she suggested that Lloyd ask any girl to prom. Alice was then shown in tears because she mistook Lloyd’s invitation to prom as a creepy serial killer letter and thought it was a sick joke because he cut out letters (“I’ve been watching you”) and pasted them on a piece of paper which he put on her locker. Lloyd was watching Alice to see her reaction, and he rapidly left the area telling sister Tess that he was never there and she never saw him. Tyler invited sophomore Lucas to his barbeque and told Lucas to bring a girl and not his friend Corey. Nova and Jesse met up inside in a school storage room, and she was mad that he was late so when he finally showed up she told him to move stuff from one place to another. He was as mean to Nova as she was to him, and he upset her by giving her tips on how to pick up heavy things instead of just helping her pick them up. Nova ranted to her parents at home about Jesse’s obnoxious behavior, and Frank said that he used to run with Jesse’s dad and the apple didn’t fall far from the tree (meaning that Frank may have been bad as Jesse’s dad because they were school chums). Nova’s mom, Kitty, was more optimistic and told Nova that perhaps Jesse could help her a lot if she gave him a chance. Frank kept calling Jesse a punk and a walking misdemeanor while Kitty said that time was running out and Nova needed Jesse’s help to get prom accomplished. Kitty went to answer the doorbell that rung while Frank told Nova to come to him if Jesse gave her any more trouble. Brandon was at the door and Frank sent another plate at the table for him, and Brandon excitedly told Nova that he got into Princeton and he was a finalist for the dean’s scholarship. Brandon went on to say that the scholarship interview was the same weekend as prom, so he wouldn’t be able to go to prom and told Nova there was still time for her to find another date, and she agreed and said she would be fine. The girls were in the bathroom hating on Brandon for doing that to their friend Nova, but Nova said it wasn’t that big of a deal. Nova stayed behind while the other two girls left to go to class because the bell rang, and then Rolo (male student) came out of the girls’ bathroom stall and washed his hands beside Nova. He obviously overheard the conversation and then walked out as if nothing happened while Nova stood there looking startled because she couldn’t figure out why Rolo (a male) was in the girls’ bathroom to begin with. Lloyd put a prom invitation made out of sticky notes on the windshield of a blue car, but then he realized that it was the wrong car (and actually belonged to Rhoda the teacher) because the girl Lloyd had wanted to invite then pulled up and got out of her very similar blue car in her super short skirt at school. In the science lab classroom, Corey told Lucas that his Jimmy Hendrix Woodstock moment could be when he asked Simone Daniels the sophomore, who just walked into the room, out on a date. Corey made Lucas do a fly (zipper) check, an armpit check, and a breath check where Lucas breathed all over Corey so he could make sure Lucas’s breath smelled all right. Simone walked up behind them wondering what they were doing because it looked like the two boys were kissing from her angle. When they were alone working on a science project, Lucas worked up the nerve and got all the words out at once to ask Simone to the lacrosse barbecue that Tyler invited him to, and she accepted. Jesse showed up fifteen minutes late and irritated Nova by calling her a dude as she was cleaning her celestial fountain. Jesse told her it was going to leak all over her “celestial,” floor unless she fixed it, and she said she already knew. At the school computers, Ali sat down next to Rolo and he was on his social media Facebook account and she asked to see Athena’s girlfriend, but he said she didn’t have a profile because she had to take it down after being grounded for staying out clubbing (Canada) too late. Lloyd hung a sheet from the highway overpass with letters asking Jen to prom, but before Jen could see it, a semi drove under the overpass and the sheet caught on the back of the big rig, tearing it down. Lloyd yelled to Jen as she drove by seconds later saying she missed his sign, but she didn’t hear him. Later on, as Nova was trying to fix the leaky fountain in dark lighting, she called Jesse out on his tough-guy act and reminded him that he was the only one who cried in third grade when Heady the class hamster died. Jesse replied that the hamster didn’t make him build a cosmic canopy for prom like Nova did. The two got into an argument about the meaning of prom and how it was overrated, and Jesse schooled Nova on real tragedies like hurricanes, smallpox and locusts, not minor setbacks like damaged prom decorations or not having prom in general. Jesse added that nobody remembered prom and any photos that were taken were stored in boxes in the attic and forgotten. Jesse then apologized because he knew how important prom was to Nova and he decided to help her out. She said that prom was the last night and the last dance, and it was all of the high schoolers (some with adults as dates) together at school for one perfect moment, which she wanted to be part of. Corey drove Simone and Lucas to Tyler’s barbecue and said that he was a driver, and his Corey’s mom corrected him in front of Simone and Lucas that Corey was only driving as long as it was during daylight hours and with adult supervision. When Lucas and Simone went to the door, Tyler welcomed people in and Simone told Lucas that she and Tyler already metand she didn’t seem too happy about being at Tyler’s house. When they had a moment alone, Tyler tried to have a private conversation with Simone, but she didn’t want to be reminded about their past relationship and told him not to talk her to her. Simone instead gave Lucas a private guitar lesson up close and personal. Lucas asked Simone if she had a boyfriend, she replied that there was one guy (Tyler) but it turned out he wasn’t available and she was over it. In school, Lloyd asked Kristen to the prom, and she replied that she thought everybody knew she had a boyfriend because she was Kristen and he was Anton, so the Hollywood name was Kranton. Anton then showed up and he and Kristen started making out crazily by the lockers. When Nova went into the storage room, she discovered that the celestial fountain was on and in perfect working order because Jesse fixed it. Nova loved it, and then Jesse explained that because of his mom’s work schedule, he had to pick his little brother up from elementary school, which was why he was late helping Nova and why he cut class, not because he was a slacker. She changed their meeting time to 3:15 when he usually showed up instead of the original 3:00 (even though 3:30 would give Jesse extra time so he wouldn’t have to rush). Lucas waited for Simone to show up in the library because he blew off Corey to study with Simone. Simone was in the hallway making her way to the library until Tyler appeared and offered to give her a ride home. She tried to blow him off, but he said that he needed to discuss something with her and she was the only one he could talk to, so she agreed. Lucas tapped his pencil on the desk and disturbed everybody studying in the library and he didn’t focus on his studies because he wasn’t happy that his female love interest didn’t show up. In his jeep, Tyler wanted to know why Simone wouldn’t answer his texts, and she told him it was because he lied to her and she never would have gone out with him if she had known he was still dating Jordan. Tyler tried to convince Simone that Jordan had been planning prom for years and expected him to go with her, so he wasn’t going to break off the relationship until after prom and then he would dump Jordan and be with Simone. Tyler told the sophmore that he was seriously interested in a romantic relationship with her. However, Jordan walked up behind them and saw Tyler and Simone talking with their heads bowed close toward each other in the front of his topless Jeep. Jordan left the scene before she could be seen. Nova later told Jesse that the neighboring high school was having the same “Starry, Starry Night,” theme with an extra Starry, so Nova thought that their prom theme would be lame because of it. Jesse had the idea of taking Nova on his motorcycle to check out the other school’s theme. They discovered that the high school’s front door was locked (obviously because it was nighttime), but then they noticed that the janitor’s side door was open and they figured they could sneak in through that door. After they were able to find the decorations and said they were lame compared to their own, they were caught by the janitor so they ran out of the school, but not before they had to run around the whole inside of the building to make their escape because they weren’t familiar with the surroundings. Just as Nova on the back of the getaway bike told Jesse that they did it, a police car with lights and sirens pulled up behind them and Jesse pulled over. As they sat alongside the side of the road waiting for Nova’s parent to pick her up, she complained to Jesse that she now had a rap sheet, but he said it wouldn’t go to that extent and not to worry about it. Frank showed up and wanted to know what Jesse did to Nova, and then Frank took his daughter away telling her that Jesse was a loser even after she told Frank that it was her idea to break into the other high school because the other school copied theme at Brookside. Simone apologized to Lucas, and he lied that he forgot about the whole library thing because Tyler wanted to show him some moves on varsity stuff (of course Simone knew Lucas wasn’t being truthful because she was with Tyler at that time). At the same time, Jordan walked over to Tyler’s locker and told him that she knew about him and his little sophomore girlfriend and she was breaking up with him. Jordan walked away telling Tyler to keep thinking about himself because that was what he was best at doing and not to worry about her. Jesse on his bike went to pick up his little brother Charlie at his school, and when he arrived Nova was talking to Charlie, who informed Nova that the expensive baseball cards he showed her were from his dad who left them behind (dad abandoned family). Jesse grabbed the cards away from Charlie and told him not to carry those around because they were supposed to stay in the basement. Nova told Jesse that the way her dad and Principal Dunnan and even herself judged Jesse’s character and talked bad about him was wrong, and she apologized for her part in it. She admitted that she ditched school to go all there and tell Jesse that. Meanwhile, Mei had a hissy fit when she tried on a prom dress, and she put it in the trash and took her anger out on Justin and told him that it wasn’t the right color or style and she looked like a manatee so no one would ever see her with that dress on. Justin thought Mei’s bad behavior with the limo (black vs. white color) and now the dress was because she didn’t want to go to prom, and he had no idea it was because she planned on going to a different college than him that was many states away. He told her that prom was off, and she let him walk away still not knowing what her issue was even after they had been dating for a long time. Jordan went home and took down the many dozens of photos accumulated over the years of her and Tyler from her dressing mirror in her bedroom and put them in the trashcan and her little sister came in Jordan’s room and told her the mirror looked better that way (obviously she had a bad vibe about Tyler and his behavior over the years). At the diner where Sandra worked, Charlie, Jesse and Nova sat at the counter and had milkshakes as they talked to Sandra (Charlie and Jesse’s mom). There were three men at a nearby table that spillied their food on purpose and then told Jesse’s mom to clean it up. Jesse wasn’t happy about that and got up to tell the other males to clean it up, but then Nova got between them and told Jesse that she wanted him to come with her so he wouldn’t fight with them and get arrested. Outside, Nova told Jesse that things didn’t come easy for anybody and even she had to work her butt off to get things accomplished. She told Jesse that he needed to grow up, stop getting into fights and driving off angry on his motorcycle. He laughed and told Nova he thought she could beat people up, and she said she could and took him dress shopping because she too had to go to prom (leaving Charlie with Sandra at the diner and the questionable delinquent males). After a few dresses that didn’t appeal to Jesse at all, he brought Nova a little black dress to try on but she handed it back to him through the curtain. Jesse asked Nova why she didn’t have a date, and after he learned that Brandon bailed on Nova, he said that maybe the class president could take her, to which she replied that she was the class president. When Nova came out of the dressing room, Jesse’s breath caught because he thought she was pretty in her sparkly beige dress. Later on, at school, Simone gave Corey and Lucas two tickets to a concert where their favorite band, Stick Hippo, was performing. Corey was excited about it but then figured out that the tickets were for Lucas and Simone only. In the library, Lloyd talked to Betsy (Elizabeth) about how boring the assigned book, Ethan’s Frome, was because it was about a guy who fell in love with his wife’s cousin and they went sledding and she got paralyzed. Lloyd used that moment to invite Betsy to the prom, but she said she already had a date and even though they were just going as friends she couldn’t cancel since prom was a few days away. Simone practiced her guitar at home, and when she heard the doorbell she went inside to find a letter on the doorstep with her name on it. It was from Tyler asking her to prom, and he told her to bring him her answer. There were two rocks, one huge one with “no,” written on it on the left side and one very small one with “yes,” written on it on the right side. Tyler appeared from behind a vehicle and smiled, and then he explained that it was over with Jordan and he ended it for real. He gave Simone a present of a guitar pick in a ring box and told her that he would love to hear her play sometime, and Simone was very happy and hugged Tyler. Ali saw Rolo trying on tuxedos in a store, and she told him she liked the white one that he was wearing and then he pulled out a picture of the dress that Athena would be wearing. Ali told him that was impossible unless Athena was a supermodel, and she wanted to know what magazine he got the picture out of. Ali said she would see both Rolo and Athena at prom. Later on, Ali and Mei were at Nova’s house and were all giggly over Nova liking bad boy Jesse, and they hoped he would ask her to the prom since the following day would be the last day they would work on the decorations together. As the girls talked, Frank was listening outside the door and he walked away unhappy when he heard his daughter say there were more important things than being valedictorian or class president. Jesse got Nova a candy necklace to wear with her dress because she said she couldn’t afford anything else except candy jewelry to go with her dress. Frank then showed up at Jesse’s work and told him that Nova was the top of her class with a full scholarship next year, and she had big plans and was in the home stretch, which was where Jesse came in right at the end. Frank said he knew Jesse’s type who struggled to get by and were mad at the world, and Frank didn’t want Jesse dragging Nova down with him as he tried to get his life figured out while Nova had her own life all together and planned out. Before he walked away, Frank told Jesse that if he cared about Nova as much as Frank thought, Jesse wouldn’t hold Nova back. As they walked out of class at school, Lucas and Corey discussed the President of the United States coming to them and saying that the country needed a new national anthem, any band, any era. Lucas stopped the conversation so he could catch up with Simone and ask her if she wanted to be picked up at six on Saturday for their concert date. Simone said that she tried to find Lucas earlier and tell him that she wouldn’t be able to make it to the concert because the guy that she liked before was now available and they were going to prom on Saturday. Jesse walked in on their last day together decorating, and he was all business and didn’t want to have any kind of conversation with Nova because of what her dad said to him. He set the disco ball light to the speed Nova wanted to and said little to her because now he wanted their prom decoration chore to be over with. Jesse said he wouldn’t be there for prom night to turn on the lights for the fountain, and he packed up his stuff saying the opposite of how he felt when Nova tried to talk about their relationship. Jesse stormed out after he lied and told Nova that he didn’t have the same feelings for her that she did for him. Lloyd, after getting turned down by another girl, sat with Lucas and discussed Simone and prom. Lloyd said that prom was a soul-crushing mistress, and he told Lucas to tell Simone how he felt about her. Lloyd had always been the shy nice guy like Lucas, so he gave Lucas some good advice to stop waiting around for the right moment and to just make it happen because he had nothing to lose. Justin threw away his corsage, and then the doorbell rang and it was Mei who wanted to talk to him out on the front porch. Mei told him that she got accepted to Parsons in New York for design, and she explained that she didn’t believe she would get in, but then she was wait-listed and got in. She told Justin that she was going to go, and he wondered why Mei thought he wouldn’t be proud of her and understood now why she was acting so crazy about prombecause it wasn’t actually about that, it was about her keeping a college secret. Mei told Justin that prom was supposed to be a “forever,” thing and couples were supposed to be a “forever,” thing too. Justin said that nobody knew the future. Mei then planned to wear her homecoming dress because it was too late to get a prom dress. Later on, Jesse showed up outside his mom’s diner, and the three delinquent males were stumbling out the door. Jesse picked a fistfight with them until Sandra came out with the manager to break it up. Sandra brought Jesse inside with Charlie to clean up Jesse’s bloody face, and the other males left the premises. Nova sobbed on her bed in the dark. Lloyd ended up taking his stepsister, Tess, to prom. In the living room as Nova was getting ready Frank confessed that he had a talk with Jesse, so it was his fault, not Nova’s, that Jesse wouldn’t take her to prom. With mom and dad in the room, Nova told her dad that he took away one of those great things that could have happened to her by removing Jesse from the picture on prom night. Nova stormed out of the house, and Kitty tried to console her husband. Lucas climbed up in a tree in the dark as Simone was dressing for prom and got her attention so he could talk to her. Lucas told Simone that he loved her as more than a friend and asked her not to go to prom, and he added that if she walked out the door then he might as well stay in the tree forever. The limo arrived and Lucas saw Tyler get out of it, and Simone told Lucas she didn’t know how to tell him that she cared for Tyler and left with Tyler to go to prom. Brandon appeared at prom and told Nova that he was there because he finished his interview early, and he congratulated Nova on pulling off the Starry Night theme. Nova walked away telling Brandon everything was not okay as he stared blankly at her. Other couples stared at Jordan as she arrived because they couldn’t believe that she came by herself like Nova. Meanwhile, as Jesse was cleaning out the basement, Sandra came down and told him he wasn’t like his dad because his dad was an idiot who got into fights whereas Jesse was a fighter who took care of his family. Sandra was proud of the way Jesse turned out, not like her husband who ran away and walked out on his responsibilities of a family. Sandra then gave Jesse a tuxedo to wear to the prom. Lucas showed up at Corey’s house and apologized and asked him to go to the concert with Lucas, and they both went. As the DJ played Katy Perry’s “Firework,” Tess went to dance with the other girls because Lloyd told her to go enjoy her youth while he sat at the table alone. When Tyler was away from Simone’s table, she heard two girls talking about how Jordan dumped Tyler and came to prom alone. Tyler came back and Simone told him off for not telling her the truth (when she wasn’t telling anybody the truth either) because Jordan dumped Tyler and he lied about it to make Simone believe that he broke up with Jordan to be with her. Mei came onstage and announced they were going to crown the king and queen as Nova held the crowns. Tyler Barso was crowned king, and then Jordan Lundley was announced as Tyler’s queen and it was a landslide vote for her. Not long after, the smile left the king’s face when he heard the queen tell Mei that she wasn’t going to dance with the king even though that was custom. Mei told everybody that the queen would be sitting the dance out so it would just be the king’s dance, by order of the queen. Tyler went over to Simone and wanted to take her out on the dancefloor, but she told him there was somewhere else she had to be and left him standing there alone with no dance partner. The partygoers skipped the king and queen dance and everybody returned to the dancefloor to dance to Neon Trees, Your Surrender. Ali turned around and saw Rolo arriving with his Greek-Canadian supermodel girlfriend. Rachel sat beside Lloyd and told him she thought it rocked that he brought his sister to prom. As Lucas and Corey came out of the concert venue they saw Simone standing in the parking lot in her prom dress waiting for them (think Sixteen Candles and Jake outside the Church) and Corey told his friend it was his Hendrix and Woodstock. Mei asked Nova to dance, but she told her girlfriend that she was all prom’d out and walked away. Ali ran over and told Nova that the fountain stopped working, and Nova replied that Ali and the others could figure it out or just leave it off because Nova was going home. Nova walked past a kissing couple and then the fountain mysteriously turned back on, and when she turned around Jesse was standing there in his tux. He asked Nova to prom, and she said yes and he gave her the candy necklace to match her dress. The DJ played Band of Horses, “No One’s Gonna Love You,” as the two lovebirds went out on the dancefloor. Meanwhile, Simone and Lucas danced in the parking lot together as Corey and his mom watched from the car. The movie ended with high school teens Nova and Jesse kissing on the dancefloor like some of the other students were doing throughout the evening. Jordan and Tyler, the supposed prom king and queen, never even came forward to say they were the ones who caused the fire that destroyed the shed and original Prom decorations.