The Prank Review: Rita Moreno Takes A Villainous Turn In Unfunny Comedy [SXSW]
Directed by Maureen Bharoocha from a screenplay by Rebecca Flinn-White and Zak White, The Prank is a lot of things, but good may not be one of them. The film tries to balance being a dark comedy with horror elements, but it doesn’t manage to master either of these genres in an effective way. Rita Moreno is wonderful as The Prank’s villain, but the film fails in its overall execution and never quite reaches its storyline potential.
Ben Palmer (Connor Kalopsis) is a great student — he has backups of backups for his homework and essays, and is diligent when it comes to submitting things on time. Ben desperately wants to go to the college his deceased father went to, but he needs to pass his AP physics midterm exam to submit his scholarship application. Unfortunately for him, his physics teacher Mrs. Wheeler (a steely Moreno) refuses to hand back the class’ grades in time until she finds whoever cheated on the test. Enter Mei Tanner (Ramona Young), Ben’s best friend who puts together a slew of fake videos, photos, and evidence to frame Mrs. Wheeler of murdering a student who went missing a while back. Naturally, the prank gets out of hand after it catches the attention of social media and the local news. But things grow more sinister as Ben and Tanner discover something quite sinister about Mrs. Wheeler.
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It’s unclear what The Prank is trying to say. One second it’s about how far the students are willing to go to exact revenge on a not-so-kind teacher; the next it’s about actually dealing with a serial killer teacher whose motives are muddled at best, and completely nonexistent at worst. It’s certainly a choice that The Prank only has one character — Ben — who feels a
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