Apt Pupil

Apt Pupil (1998) 111 mins.

directed Bryan Singer

starring Brad Renfro, Ian McKellen, Joshua Jackson

 After teenager Todd Bowden discovers that his neighbor is a Nazi war criminal, he blackmails him into telling him gruesome stories of the Holocaust.  As their relationship grows, Todd's whole life changes as he starts to learn what evil really looks like.

Q Says:

i read the stephen king story many, many years ago and i remember thinking it was really good and also that i found it dark, compelling, and disturbing.  i can’t recall any details...just feelings.   like the feeling that i absolutely hated the main character, todd bowden.  i remember wanting to beat him about the head and shoulders for being such a sick & twisted little pissant.

the first thing i thought while starting to watch the film was how easily the nazi-loving high school kid discovers an actual nazi, kurt dussander (ian mckellen), in his hometown.  very coincidental, eh?

also, as a funny aside: it’s really hard for me to see gandalf as a nazi.

the other thing i felt was that brad renfro was not impressive.  he seemed pretty emotionless up until a pivotal scene (we’ll talk about that in a minute).

for the first 30-45 minutes i felt none of the things that i felt while reading the book so many years ago and i have decided to read it again to see if i was wrong.  maybe i’m confusing it with another story.  the movie felt a little glossy and sugarcoated up until the scene i said i would talk about in a minute.

here’s the scene i mentioned: the movie takes a slight turn for the better when todd buys the old nazi a costume nazi uniform.  at first, dussander wants nothing to do with it.  however, todd demands that he wears it or he’ll turn him in to the authorities and he also demands that he marches in place.  as dussander does so you see the slow transformation in dussander as he really starts to relive the old days through this costume.  todd tries to get him to stop but dussander refuses and this is where the tables of power start to turn.  this is where ian mckellen starts to turn on the nazi-evil.  this is where you start to ask, who is really in control of the other? 

that scene held much promise for the rest of the movie...but the rest of the movie fell short. 

typical twists and plot turns lead to the nazi helping the kid study for school so he doesn’t fail and the kid murdering a transient and saving the nazis life to keep their secrets a little longer.

but things unravel when the nazi is in the hospital after suffering a heart attack in the fight with the transient and in yet another blazing coincidence:  there’s a former concentration camp jew in the room with the nazi that murdered his family in the war!!  WTF!??!  the jew turns him in but todd goes free!!  what the hell, man!??  the kid gets to go free and in a pivotal scene in the end you find that he is starting to become more like the nazi than ever before.  and it also took forever to get all this out.  the end of this movie felt longer than return of the king!!

i really wanted to see the kid get his.  i was left very dissatisfied.  the movie, overall, was OK.  bryan singer didn’t bring his A-game on this one and i probably won’t watch this one again.

side note: david schwimmer’s mustache is da bomb!

L Says:

  I got the feeling that this movie was supposed to be a little more chilling than it was.  Todd Bowden (Brad Renfro, who I used to have a MAJOR crush on) is a seemingly normal teenager.  He's top of the class, making A's and in line to be the valedictorian.  And he likes to do research.  Especially on the Holocaust and the horrors of it.  The movie opens with Todd sitting in the library with a plethora of pictures, letters, articles and books about the Holocaust and the men responsible for it.  He also keeps a secret suitcase in his room filled with a file on a man he believes to be a Nazi war criminal hiding in his own neighborhood.  After confronting the old man named Kurt Dussander (Ian McKellen), Todd blackmails him with the file and forces him to tell him stories of the Holocaust.  Todd wants to know what the teachers aren't telling him.  Like how horrible the gas chamber really was and what exactly happened.  And that is the only story we hear.  It was almost as if they wanted to push the envelope, but held back.  A lot.  Todd has one "nightmare" about the gas chamber and later blames his slipping grades on all these sleepless nights we never see.  

  Ian McKellen is the real thing.  Before he was Gandalf.  Before he was Magneto.  He was Kurt Dussander, an old man on the run from his past.  He lives a quiet existence until Todd shows up on his doorstep.  There are two scenes that really stand out for me.  The first is, of course, the marching scene.  Todd buys him a Nazi costume to wear and tells him to stand at attention.  Kurt's face when he steps to attention is great.  A slight smile, as if he finds it funny that he remembers his training after all these years.  Then, he starts marching and slowly gets into it.  Like really gets into it.  Saluting and all.  Todd gets scared and has to tell him to stop repeatedly.  You can kind of see at that moment, that maybe Todd should have left Kurt Dussander alone.  The other scene I really liked, was just after Todd pulled it together and was able to get his grades back up, he and Kurt were in Kurt's kitchen celebrating with melba toast.  Yum.  Anyway, Kurt has one more story to tell.  He tells Todd that he has written everything that has happened down (Todd knowing he was a Nazi monster and never telling authorities, Todd turning into a psycho), and stored it in a bank safe deposit box.  Todd, of course, freaks out.  The old man is not going to let this punk kid take him down without a fight.  Kurt pours Todd a glass of whiskey and insists that they toast on their "friendship".  Todd tells him to go fuck himself.  Kurt replies, "oh, my dear boy.  Don't you see?  We are fucking each other." You suddenly realize that this old man is not someone to mess with. 

  I suppose Brad Renfro does an okay job as Todd.  Just a touch psycho, but still feeling like he was holding back.  He has a few outbursts.  He kills a bird with a basketball.  Oh, and he does kill the homosexual homeless man that Kurt has pushed into the basement (played by Elias Koteas).  You can almost see Todd's hold on reality slipping, but as I said, he never quite loses it.  David Schwimmer shows up as Todd's guidance counselor.  I think he kind of senses that maybe Todd is messed up in the head.  He doesn't do much in the movie.  And Joshua Jackson shows up as Todd's best friend for about 8 minutes.  

  I think this movie was really trying to show how evil can exist in everyday life and can be passed on.  Kurt pushing Todd to kill the homeless man in the basement is a real turning point for the teen.  Later, when Kurt is in the hospital after suffering a heart attack, he asks Todd what did it feel like?  Todd never answers, but as the movie (finally!) ends, and Kurt dies, we see that Todd may be picking up where Kurt left off.  

  I don't know if I will watch this again.  I think I liked it so much the first time I saw it because of Ian McKellen's performance.  I do want to read the story now.  I read that in the story, Todd gets what's coming to him.

David Schwimmer's sweet 'stache