''Fun'' is a 1994

Canadian Canadians () are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being ''C ...

independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in Pennsylvania, United States * Independentes (English: Independents), a Portuguese artist ...

drama film In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. The drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular ...

starring

Alicia Witt Alicia Roanne Witt (born August 21, 1975) is an American actress and musician. She first came to fame as a child actress after being discovered by David Lynch, who cast her in ''Dune'' (1984) and ''Twin Peaks'' (1990). Witt was a regular on Cyb ...

and Renée Humphrey, and directed by

Rafal Zielinski Rafal Zielinski (b 1957) is a Canadian film director, producer and screenwriter best known for his work for Roger Corman in the 1980s. In 1983 he and his producing partners signed a seven-picture deal with Corman, starting with ''Screwballs''.

. The film centers on the murder of an elderly woman by two mentally unstable girls. Both Witt and Humphrey won a Special Jury Recognition award at the 1994

Sundance Film Festival The Sundance Film Festival is an annual film festival organized by the Sundance Institute. It is the largest independent film festival in the United States, with 423,234 combined in-person and online viewership in 2023. The festival has acted ...

. The film is based on a play by James Bosley, which was in turn based on an actual murder that was committed in

Auburn, California Auburn is a city in and the county seat of Placer County, California, United States. Its population was 13,776 during the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. Auburn is known for its California Gold Rush history and is registered as a Califo ...

in 1983 by 14-year-old Shirley Wolf and 15-year-old Cindy Collier. The film's title is derived from a diary entry by Wolf, which read: "Today, Cindy and I ran away and killed an old lady. It was lots of fun." The film is told in flashbacks detailing the girls' relationship (in color), and their time in juvenile detention center (in black and white).

Plot

Bonnie, aged 14, and Hillary, aged 15, meet at a bus stop in

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

, California, and begin a friendship. They stroll around their city, chuck rocks onto a

highway A highway is any public or private road or other public way on land. It includes not just major roads, but also other public roads and rights of way. In the United States, it is also used as an equivalent term to controlled-access highway, or ...

from an overpass bridge, run rampant in shopping malls, and play

video games A video game or computer game is an electronic game that involves interaction with a user interface or input device (such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device) to generate visual fe ...

. In a stream of careless chatter, Hillary reveals to Bonnie that her father is in prison for raping her and Bonnie recounts of how joking around with her brother turned into intercourse, and that she has kept this to herself. Their day escalates into an eruption of violence and rage when they brutally stab an elderly woman to death. They then run to a

gas station A filling station (also known as a gas station [] or petrol station []) is a facility that sells fuel and engine lubricants for motor vehicles. The most common fuels sold are gasoline (or petrol) and diesel fuel. Fuel dispensers are used to ...

and attempt to wash off the blood from their clothes. After their arrest, they claim that the murder was purely just for "fun". The story moves from the juvenile detention center where the girls are kept, to the girls on the day of the killing.

Cast

* Renée Humphrey as Hillary *

as Bonnie *

William R. Moses William Remington Moses (born November 17, 1959) is an American actor. Early life Moses was born in Los Angeles, the son of actress Marian McCargo (1932–2004) and advertising executive Richard Cantrell Moses Sr., who married in 1951 and divorc ...

as John *

Leslie Hope Leslie Hope is a Canadian actress and director, best known for her role as Teri Bauer on the Fox television series '' 24'' and prosecutor Anita Gibbs on ''Suits''. Other credits include '' Shadow Builder'' (1998), ''Murdoch Mysteries'', ''The ...

as Jane *Ania Suli as Mrs. Farmer

Critical reception

James Berardinelli James Berardinelli (born September 25, 1967) is an American film critic. His reviews are mainly published on his blog ''ReelViews.'' Approved as a critic by the aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, he has published two collections of reviews of movies on ...

of ''ReelViews'' gave the film a strongly positive review, commending the film’s character development, cinematography, and Witt's performance. He said it succeeds at giving insight into the disturbed "psyches of two memorable characters". In contrast, Sheila Johnston of ''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...

'' was more mixed; though she felt the film felt too thematically similar to recent films about "the blank generation", such as ''

Heavenly Creatures ''Heavenly Creatures'' is a 1994 New Zealand biographical film directed by Peter Jackson, from a screenplay he co-wrote with his partner, Fran Walsh. It stars Melanie Lynskey and Kate Winslet in their feature film debuts, with Sarah Peirse, Dian ...

'' and ''

Natural Born Killers ''Natural Born Killers'' is a 1994 American romantic crime action film directed by Oliver Stone and starring Woody Harrelson, Juliette Lewis, Robert Downey Jr., Tommy Lee Jones, and Tom Sizemore. The film tells the story of two victims ...

'', she said, "The main reason to see it is the exceptional performances from the two young leads, Alicia Witt as the crazed, hyperactive, almost infantile Bonnie and Renee Humphrey as her brooding, introverted friend." On review aggregator

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review aggregator, review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee ...

, ''Fun'' has an approval rating of 82% based on 11 reviews, with an average score of 7.0 out of 10.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Fun (film) 1994 crime drama films 1990s teen films Canadian crime drama films English-language Canadian films Films directed by Rafal Zielinski Films set in Los Angeles Teensploitation Teen crime films Films about murder Canadian films based on plays 1990s English-language films 1990s Canadian films Canadian independent films 1994 independent films Sundance Film Festival award–winning films English-language independent films English-language crime drama films Films about psychopaths and sociopaths