What I watched: Election (1999)
I discovered this film because of Fantasy High: Junior Year, and the comparison between the character of Kipperllily Copperkettle and Tracy Flick.
The first scene during the generic is a montage of the morning routine of Matthew Broderic's character and Tracy Flick. However, where the teacher's action are show in full, and his face clearly visible, Tracy's action are shown in a close up, her face obscured and a harsh sound accompany each of her movement. The framing builds empathy for the teacher, but deny it for Tracy.
That's the movie in a nutshell. The message of the film is not "people are motivated by selfish desire despite how much they deny it" it is "people who have selfish desire are more deserving of empathy." Of all the four narrators, Tracy Flick's inner life is the one that is the least explore. In fact, there are many women in the narrative, yet the film tends to be (not always!) from the viewpoint of the male characters.
I have seen an interesting argument that the movie has sympathie for it's women character because they all end up in a better place at the end of the film after the creeps are forced to leave. That is true, but my reply is that the way the scenes are presented, the way they are filmed, gives more sympathy to the male characters then the female ones.
What is interesting is that Tracy's narration says the relationship with the math teacher was mutual, then the next scene contradict it. That is something the film does a few time, it's part of the "people lie to themselves" idea. So the relationship is presented as predatory. But the film never really explore the consequence on Tracy. The film is just not interested in her perspective.
