Review: 'Frontrunners'

Documentary follows the insanely competitive race for student council president at Stuyvesant High School in New York City.

from the October 10, 2008 edition

Caroline Suh's "Frontrunners" is a documentary about the race for student council president at the insanely competitive Stuyvesant High School in New York City. Like all too many docs these days, it chronicles a contest while caricaturing the contestants. The film is clearly intended as a microcosm of the US presidential elections, although the students' cutthroat tactics are bush-league in comparison. And thank goodness for that: If high school presidential hopefuls start carrying on like their smear-happy elders, there's no hope for the republic. Grade: B- (Unrated.)