How The Perks of Being a Wallflower Became a Generation-Defining Classic
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The post How The Perks of Being a Wallflower Became a Generation-Defining Classic appeared first on Consequence.
The Perks of Being a Wallflower came at a very interesting moment for millennial/Gen-Z cusp high schoolers. Based on the popular 1999 novel by Stephen Chbosky and adapted by Chbosky in 2012, Perks arrived a decade ago during the height of “the Tumblr era,” when teens at the time like myself gravitated to the website’s curation of hipster trends and nostalgia-inflected aesthetics.
On an average day in the early 2010s, chances were high you would come across a crying Logan Lerman GIF, an image of the Perks cast sitting on some bleachers, or a screenshot of one of the film’s iconic aphorisms, “In this moment, I swear we are infinite” and “We accept the love we think we deserve,” on your feed.
Even though the overuse of those quotes and pictures ultimately sapped them of their poignancy, Perks signaled an important turning point in the cultural conversation around mental health. Amid a rapidly changing social media landscape, lonely teens who yearned for connection could identify with Perks’s honest, delicate exploration of mental illness, trauma, and social isolation.
Of course, Perks deserves to be remembered way more than just as wholesome, twee online fodder. In contrast to the raunchy, male-oriented YA fare that dominated much of the 2000s, the film introduced an alternative take on teen angst for contemporary audiences, harkening back to the nuanced work of John Hughes but with a more introspective touch. It was a funny and tender coming-of-age drama that celebrated the fleeting nature of adolescence — as much as it probed the complex, underdiscussed issues that came with it.
Considering its relative critical and commercial success as well as its influence on the string of thematically similar films that followed it (namely 2013’s The Spectacular Now, 2014’s The Fault in Our Stars, and 2015’s Me and Earl and the Dying Girl) it’s worth looking back on just what exactly makes Perks so special and formative.
Set in Pittsburgh in the early ‘90s, Chbosky’s soulful, piercing tale of teenhood followed the titular wallflower, a shy yet sharply perceptive bookworm named Charlie (Lerman), during his first year in high school. Feeling invisible and excluded by his peers, he develops a friendship with gay, fun-loving senior Patrick (Ezra Miller) and a crush on Patrick’s sweet stepsister Sam (Emma Watson).
Under Patrick and Sam’s encouraging wing, Charlie begins experimenting with LSD and weed, attending The Rocky Horror Picture Show, and pursuing his aspiration of writing. While indulging in these discoveries, Charlie wrestles with the psychological reprecussions of his best friend’s suicide the year before and a repressed history of sexual abuse from his late Aunt Helen (Melanie Lynskey). Lacking closure from both experiences, Charlie struggles to confront his own pain, even as he attempts to rehabilitate everyone else’s.
In addition to its bittersweet emotional template, what immediately sets Perks apart from the average American coming-of-age story is that Charlie is not a typical American teen male protagonist. He possesses an endless wealth of empathy and compassion, a humility that isn’t disingenuous, a maturity that isn’t annoyingly precocious, and musical taste that may come off pretentious on the surface but feels very true at that age, of wanting to absorb everything that made you seem cool or moved you in some way. (Who among us hasn’t had a Smiths phase?)
Sure, Charlie’s still flawed and makes egregious choices, including an ill-advised kiss during a game of Truth or Dare that stands as one of the film’s most infamously cringey moments. But there’s no aggressive bravado or machismo entitlement in his actions. He never seems fixated on trying to have sex for the first time nor interested in conforming to other people’s expectations. Charlie is simply himself and his new friends accept him not despite his differences, but because of them.
The support of those friends both help Charlie come to terms with his fraught past and give Perks its multifaceted edge. Patrick represents yet another one of Perks’s subversions of traditional masculinity as well as a refreshing addition to queer on-screen representation.
He doesn’t reinforce the “gay best friend” stereotype nor falls prey to the “kill your gays” trope. Rather, Chbosky shades Patrick with a cutting wit and an infectious personality, acknowledging the marginalization he faces for his sexuality but refusing to let it overshadow his humanity.
As Patrick, Miller gives the film’s richest performance, layering a well-developed role with fierce comic timing and affecting melancholy. It’s an inspired snapshot of a once-promising talent whose disturbing behavior in these past few years renders the performance all the more tragic. It’s especially queasy given the film’s examination of abuse, and the ways it warps and complicates our understanding of people we love.
Watson does decent work as Sam, shaky American accent and occasionally awkward line delivery aside. Despite getting some of the film’s cringiest dialogue — “Welcome to the island of misfit toys” being the worst offender — Watson convincingly grounds Sam with an endearing charm and sometimes quietly devastating restraint, to the point where you almost completely forget that she just had finished starring in one of the biggest movie franchises of all time the year before.
Her moving relationship to Charlie (and genuine chemistry with Logan) also creates some compelling dramatic tension throughout the film. Their shared affinity for sad indie rock music and history of older people taking advantage of them draws them closer to one another.
But like Patrick’s clandestine affair with a jock, Sam chooses to be with someone who doesn’t treat or respect her in the way she deserves, leaving Charlie heartbroken. Even when the two do eventually consummate their romance, it overwhelms Charlie, awakening repressed memories of his aunt’s abuse that culminates in a mental spiral during the film’s haunting climax.
Heavy as its themes were, The Perks of Being a Wallflower balanced its gravitas with the levity and abundant charm of its supporting cast. Along with its perfectly assembled central trio, the ensemble featured young indie/mainstream crossover darlings (Mae Whitman, Johnny Simmons, Nina Dobrev), established yet underrated character actors (Lynskey, Paul Rudd, Kate Walsh, Dylan McDermott, Joan Cusack), and on-the-rise stars (Ozark’s Julia Garner, Succession’s Nicholas Braun).
And like any great coming-of-age tale, Perks also boasts a wonderful soundtrack, replete with art-rock tunes that punctuate some of the most resonant scenes. The joyful “Come on Eileen” by Dexy’s Midnight Runners plays during the narratively crucial homecoming sequence where Charlie finally gets the courage to dance with Sam and Patrick. Charlie becomes obsessed with “Asleep” by The Smiths when he listens to his sister Candace’s (Dobrev) mixtape for the first time, compelling him to place it on mixtapes he gifts to Sam and Patrick.
The Perks of Being a Wallflower (Summit Entertainment)
Most notably, Charlie and his friends dub “Heroes” by David Bowie as “the tunnel song” as it blares on the radio while they drive down the Fort Pitt Bridge at night. “Heroes” in particular is an effective inclusion, a rousing and triumphant anthem that vividly captures that “infinite” feeling Charlie experiences during the ride. Its second goosebump-inducing needle drop toward the film’s end also makes for one of the best closing songs in a movie maybe ever (eat your heart out, Jojo Rabbit!).
Obviously, Perks isn’t without its flaws. Eclectic as it is, the cast is blindingly white, though Perks is certainly not the only teen flick to commit that sin. With the exception of the period-accurate technology (mixtapes, vinyls, typewriters, landline phones), it reads as way more modern than ‘90s, which likely spoke to its appeal to terminally online teens in the early ‘10s. The story doesn’t particularly contend with or seem interested in highlighting the privileged, upper-middle backgrounds of its characters; socioeconomic status tends to be a key element in most coming-of-age films, but here, it’s not even touched upon.
Despite its imperfections, Perks gets so much right about adolescence, mainly that it’s as much about discovering the person you want to become as it is about grieving the person you no longer are. Charlie feels the heartache and suffering all around him on such an intensely visceral level. He keenly observes how his loved ones’s attempts to hide and forget their pain inform their self-sabotaging behaviors, leading him to brace the bottled-up mix of guilt and anguish behind his childhood assault.
But as he notes in the film’s final chapter, even if we don’t have the power to choose where we come from, we can still choose where we go from there. Rather than letting his past traumas and debilitating fear of being his authentic self eat him up inside, Charlie chooses to build intimate friendships and participate both in and outside class, which not only heals his pain, but emancipates him from it.
Perks, the novel, had the same effect on me during the summer in 2011, right before I entered ninth grade like Charlie. Coming out of middle school a bit socially scathed, I was immediately drawn to Charlie’s loneliness with being left out, his anxious desire to interact with older kids, his frustrations with seeing people he loves make bad decisions, and his eager consumption of the pop culture around him.
Though many of its themes paralleled with Catcher in the Rye, this text felt different from anything else I had read up to that point. Charlie’s journey spoke to how badly I want to connect with the people around me, even though my personality and interests didn’t align with the social circles I was tied to.
The film came out in the fall of my sophomore year of high school, a time where I was just starting to feel comfortable coming into my own in a new social environment. Although Charlie and I have some radical differences — Vampire Weekend was my Smiths — it was both eerie and affirming watching him go through the same motions as I did, of establishing emotionally rewarding friendships, confronting neglected personal wounds, and seeking out art and writing as a cathartic outlet for self-expression.
Now, 10 years later, The Perks of Being a Wallflower feels like watching a memory, not just because of its warm and fuzzy visuals, its wistful soundtrack, or the innocent, young faces of its characters. Quite simply, it is the cinematic equivalent of getting a cozy hug from a good friend, on a breezy autumn school day.
The Perks of Being a Wallflower is streaming now on HBO Max.
How The Perks of Being a Wallflower Became a Generation-Defining Classic
Sam Rosenberg
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