Obviously, some of the pressures they faced were fairly foreign to me. I kind of bypassed the whole peer pressure thing, and when I got to college I was self-assured enough to spot superficiality when it was coming at me.

Evan, I’ve also seen some people call Burnstein out on the carpet for not pushing a particular agenda, and instead just documenting the lives of these students as they happen. I guess I missed the memo about when that was all of a sudden considered inadequate.

By the way, I find it interesting that this resonated with you, even though you didn’t go to high school in the States.

And Lou, Spellbound had that central competition of the National Spelling Bee anchoring it while this one is more of a coming-of-age character study. Similar in some ways, but I think the emotional reaction you will get out of each is different.

Nanette Burnstein was at the screening I attended in April at the MSPIFF, and despite all the press that has come out since AT’s release, I still find myself trusting her claims that nothing was recreated other than the text message scene. I had a lot of respect for her walking out of that theater, and I find the contradictory criticism of the film baffling. If we can all so intimately connect with the simple characters that we recognize from our past, why would Burnstein need to cajole and create a story out of it? It’s the kind of documentary that needs no embellishment. In fact I might even ruffle some feathers and say that Man on Wire might have played itself more dramatically than American Teen, specifically in the ***SPOILER*** uncorroborated account of how Petit received the arrow in the nude. It takes nothing away from MoW, which is outstanding, but I just wonder why everyone is so obsessed with accusing AT of doing something it had no reason to do.

Loved the film. I’m very interested in seeing her previous work now.