Beyond Clueless

The greatest trick the teen movie ever pulled was convincing the world it wasn't worth a second look. A genre more than fifty years in the making, teen cinema has grown from a lowly sideshow to a staple of the Hollywood landscape, yet it remains a curiously unexamined phenomenon. Diving headfirst into the inner psyche of the teen genre, the film finds itself within a parallel universe - one occupied by an entire generation of big-screen teens we've loved and loathed in equal measure. Part adolescent fever dream, part roving visual essay, Beyond Clueless puts the movies themselves under the microscope on a quest to lay bare the genre's beating heart. Forgotten classics are unearthed, old favorites are upturned to reveal new meanings, and questions are asked about what's really going on behind the raucous house parties, glittering prom nights and joyous graduations that make up this most beguiling of cinematic worlds.