Title: Blame
MPAA Rating: Not Rated
Director: Quinn Shepard
Starring: Nadia Alexander, Chris Messina, Quinn Shepard
Runtime: 1 hr 40 mins

What It Is: Melissa (Alexander) is a queen at her high school. All the guys want her and all the girls want to be her. When bullied student Abigail (Shepard) returns to school Melissa wants to victimize her and make sure she knows who runs things. A new drama teacher named Mr. Woods (Messina) comes into the picture and immediately recognizes Abigail’s love of theater as they attempt a showcase of Arthur Miller’s The Crucible. As Melissa grows more and more jealous of Abigail and her relationship with Jeremy (Mr. Woods) things start to escalate.

What We Think: Quinn Shepard is 23 years old. She is also fantastic in this film both behind the camera and in front of it. She has an eye for details and an ability here to play within the margins of good and evil. The margins between awkwardness and sexiness. All of the acting is good here. Shepard’s script was more than the average high school script and instead dove into the concepts of jealousy, sexuality amongst teachers and students among many other issues here.

Our Grade: A-, I walked out of this one in complete surprise. I really thought to myself “oh another stupid January release” what I got instead was an interesting look into both the teenage girl psyche as well as obsession and the effects of it. I can recommend that everyone check this film out as it is an unbelievable surprise. You’re not supposed to judge a book by its cover and in this case, I feel like that is definitely the case here. What easily could’ve slipped under the radar is instead a welcomed surprise. I cannot wait to see what Shepard does next, perhaps the start of a fantastic career from a rather young starlet.