Skipped Parts (2000)

Highly Overrated But Still Good

A lot of fun.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

I found this film to be a welcome relief from the self-righteous, hypocritical obsession with sex as evil in our confused society. I'm sure that viewers aligned with the extreme religious right are aghast at the sexual frankness of "Skipped Parts". I only wish they were as upset over the war in Iraq, America's obsession with violence and the rampant intolerance still pervading the home of the free. Instead, sex and four-letter words top the list of moral outrages in the minds of far too many of our number."Skipped Parts" is a compassionate view of outside-the-mainstream people at odds with the establishment. Granted, unprotected sex among teenagers is impractical and unwise, but hardly a reason to despise and condemn. Especially by those who have, as do some of the characters in the film, plenty of skeletons in their own closets.Well-written, well-acted and well-directed, "Skipped Parts" is a moral film in which the highest virtues are kindness, forgiveness, and love.

I was watching this movie with my roommate on one of those i-have-nothing-better-to-do-evenings. I was really surprised to find out i actually liked this film. Other people have commented on this movie by saying it was to far fetched. But to be honest i don't get that. I know that this film is somewhat surreal, but reality isn't that far behind. I mean teen do get pregnant and when they lack good sex education (so to speak) they do experiment and pregnancy is the logical result. The film is sort of happy go lucky but it didn't bother me. I really liked the fact that it talked openly about pregnancy's among young people. I also thought it was rather sarcastic. Especially the last comment "welcome to the modern American family". I don't think that was serious but really sarcastic. I think it's save to say this movie was really cool. I recommend it to anyone who has an open view on such matters.

I thought the modern take on Romeo & Juliet in the Paul Sorvino/Lanie Kazan comedy 'Is Love All There Is' was the most ridiculous tale of young kids in love gone overboard that I had ever seen. That was, of course, until I watched Skipped Parts. Skipped Parts is the story of a 'bohemian' type of mother and son (at least by the rural Southwestern mid 60s standards) who basically turn their town's conventions upside down to a heavy degree. Lydia, a fantastic part played well by Jennifer Jason Leigh (it is a part reminiscent of her role as the punchy undercover journalist in 'The Hudsucker Proxy'), is kicked out of her North Carolina home where she lived with her overbearing, strict father in order to avoid embarrassment during his Senate campaign. Lydia is hanging by a thin string, already proved to be ill equipped to deal with responsibility. Thus, her teen son, is more of an equal, and an intelligent one to make up for the lack of parenting on Lydia's part.Together, they arrive in a small, 'proper' town in Wyoming, both hopelessly lost and terribly out of place, of course, given their nature. But this story and the two's effect on the town are more like an unfocused rebellion. That in the face of such staunch idiocy and conservatism by the town, Lydia and her son Sam (Bug Hall) are just going to to completely turn the town around, whether on purpose or by accident. With no direction, but just to rebel. The product is something even more out-of-wack than the small town was prior to their arrival, just in the opposite manner, so to speak. Sam befriends a pristine classmate, played by a very young Micha Barton. The two fourteen year olds develop more than just a 'show me yours and I'll show you mine' interest in sex. And with Lydia and her zany friend's encouragement, they do some experimenting. This is weird in the first place. Maybe not if we weren't such a sexual-conscious culture when it came to teenagers, but we are. Weird even for me. But, the two teenagers, who seem to like this experimentation, don't know when to give up, especially considering Lydia's warnings that once the girl gets her period, it's over. Well, I guess it's no surprise why this movie never hit mainstream release, or at least widespread mainstream release, considering the field day the religious right would have with this movie (and the book on which it's based?), with such young kids going for sex, and on top of everything else, a fourteen year old getting pregnant. And on top of that, keeping the baby. Meanwhile, we still see Sam as just a child. With his boyish fantasies about the movie star on screen and the like. How is it anyone thought they'd be capable of raising a child? How is it these kids thought so? The situation is taken way too lightly, and that's hard to get past.Other events in the town set off more chaos, possibly all started by the 'sex games' that Sam and his friend endure. But, that is more tolerable in mainstream American movies. The seemingly perfect wife having an affair and an abortion; the irresponsible mother being unable to commit and all of that. It's typical American fare, even in comedies. But somehow, I just can't get past how bizarre and how far things go between Sam and Maurey (Barton). It is an entirely strange, and more than not, an unbelievable situation. I think they went a little far with the intentions of showing how two 'liberated' people can have such a domino effect on such a tight-fisted town, for good or for worse.

After seeing Skipped Parts, and reading all the user reviews, I see why so many are repelled by the movie, but I'm one of the ones fascinated by it. In order to care about a movie, I have to care about at least one character, and in this movie, it definitely was the case, with the Sam Callahan young male part. Although it's true that hardly anyone went through what Sam and his young girlfriend went through, it was captivating to me to see Sam want, so much, to be a real boyfriend to his rather matter-of-fact fellow sexual experimenter. I identified his caring for, and attraction to, girls, with my own young life. As for his mom's character: yes, she was waaayy out there, but I have known women like that, so they *do* exist. I think that, overall, Skipped Parts is one of those movies where you have to give in to the situation a little, and go with it. IF (and this is critical) you have been through at least some of the feelings, if not actual situations, these characters experience, I think you'll agree that the 93 minutes, or so, spent in their world is not wasted time (although I think one time was enough for me...too many other great movies out there to see!).