Rushmore

Rushmore has been called the best movie of 1998. While I would like to see a small, independent original film like this succeed, it really isn’t best-of-the-year caliber. Newcomer Jason Schwartzman plays a type of nerd I had heretofore been unfamiliar with: an overachiever in extracurricular activities without the brains to match. After doing poorly in his classes and causing problems with his gigantic dreams, Max (Schwartzman) is kicked out of the Rushmore academy. He comes to grips with his true identity in the public school system while he and Herman (Bill Murray) fight for the affections of a first grade teacher. Murray is great in this movie, and writing is crisp and incisive. But the quirkiness seems a little forced, a little overdone.