Sordid tale of youthful degeneracy that makes a fine companion piece to Larry Clark's BULLY. (Highly intriguing Miss Bijou Phillips plays similar roles in both films.) The chief selling point of HAVOC seems to be Anne Hathaway's breasts. After years of being America's Disney darling in movies like ELLA ENCHANTED and THE PRINCESS DIARIES she seems to have decided that she will no longer appear in any film where she does not expose her ample bosom. Amazingly, this semi-pornographic After School Special has real talent at the helm: Directed by Barbara Kopple, who first became famous for the documentary Harlan County, U.S.A. (1976), and written by Oscar winner Stephen Gaghan (Traffic).HAVOC is an entertaining movie that is an exploitation film at heart… using social anxiety about what our kids are up to as a pretext for sensationalism. Rich spoiled teenagers in Los Angeles listen to too much hip-hop and seek to imitate the "gangsta lifestyle." When Hathaway and Phillips' rich kid posse hit the mean streets to score some drugs Hathaway's boyfriend has a very bad experience with a Latino drug dealer. After seeing the drug dealer humiliate her beau Hathaway can't stop thinking about him. Soon she and side-kick Phillips are trying to become Latino gang molls.
The initiation ceremony (for girls, at least) is to roll one die to determine how many of the gang members you have to take on in a gang-bang. Things get way out of hand but everybody learns a valuable lesson.
94 minute unrated edition. Aspect Ratio 1.85:1. Available Subtitles: English, Spanish • Available Audio Tracks: English (DTS 5.1), English (Dolby Digital 5.1), English (Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround)
