Much ado is made about the whale-like lead character of Terri (Jacob Wysocki) wearing pajamas to class as if it were the most inventive and creative idea to come along since the internet. (Thank you again for that one Al Gore) When his empathetic assistant principal Mr. Fitzgerald (John C. Reilly as his usual top-shelf performance) asks “what’s up?” Terri takes the first of what will be several long pauses of various lengths during the film before answering, “Because they’re comfortable.”
Before we’re done the film we’re expected to buy that Mr. Fitzgerald not only awakens Terri from his self-pity at the hands of his peers’ victimization but also that Terri ends up having the class looker Heather fall for him after he comes to her aid after she’s embarrassed letting her boyfriend finger her in a lab class. (Terri’s not a comedy). Not so strangely, and to director Azazel Jacobs’ credit, both conceits are plausible.
Where Terri (the film) gets in trouble isn’t for a lack of credibility but, oddly, because of it. The film’s crescendo is a night of debauchery where one thing leads to three or four others between Terri, Heather, and there’s-one-in-every-crowd Chad, a with-friends-like-this-who-needs-enemies brat that Terri meets outiside Fitzgerald’s office. Disaster doesn’t ensue and the kids survive what was a frank and harrowing evening. We admire the authenticity of its rendering, yet something doesn’t feel right. Is this film bending over backwards to pat itself on the back? Is it a slice-of-life depiction so much higher on the reality scale that all the inert moments in between the film’s little action intensifies that action to actually give us an impression we’ve seen something great?
Probably not.
But I once wore a bathrobe and slippers to a college class. Didn’t bat much of an eye at it since it was the 70s.
5.5 pajamas out of 10
