Sofia Coppola's directorial debut adaptation of Jeffrey Eugenides's
novel has enough interesting performances and gloomy grace to
make for a tolerable rental, but seems a wan after-echo of the
many more accomplished recent movies (i.e., Election, Rushmore,
American Beauty, and Welcome to the Dollhouse) that
have raised the school/family dysfunction stakes. James Woods
is great as nerdy suburban math teacher dad Mr. Lisbon, and Kathleen
Turner is scary as stout smothering mother Mrs. Lisbon. Kirsten
Dunst raises sparks as the oldest and lustiest of the doomed Lisbon
sisters. But the voiceover narration (by Giovanni Ribisi) meant
to reproduce the novel's collective viewpoint of a group of neighborhood
boys recalling their obsession with the tantalizing and mysterious
Lisbon sisters seems stale and unfocused. None of the boys makes
much impression, which is partly a good thing as they come off
as actual kids and not budding WB-network megateens, but the resulting
lack of focus contributes to an underwhelming dream quality. The
title's suicides are insufficiently motivated, and thus somewhat
cheaply sensationalized. The Virgin Suicides is a dream
that doesn't linger with you for long.