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As compared my to own high school experiences, the views taken by Alexander Payne are thrown quite askew, but are miserably accurate. "I really must insist that you help me win this election tomorrow." This statement is said in prayer by Tracy Flick the night before the election,as the characters that are in the running for student government president are also praying. Are teens praying? It's not all the far-fetched to imagine, so why can't it happen? Are teens on a rampage for electoral victory? I've seen it happen. Everyone has seen a student election that has taken a turn for the worse and started a little mudslinging. One day, during the weekend, Tracy is at the school late and as she walks by her poster falls down. She tries to fix it by standing on a garbage can but it slips out from under her and her best banner is ripped in half. She is so enraged by this that she tears down every poster put up by her opponents. .
However, a few things change when you throw a teacher's voice into the mixture of all these thoughts swirling around in a supposedly innocent teen's mind. The character of Jim McAllister is seen to meddle in more than one student's life during the movie, even though he should really be focusing on his own, which is completely typical that he's even doing this in the first place. When Mr. McAllister approaches Paul Metzler (Chris Klein) telling him, "Isn't it time you gave something back?" he's really thinking "Run against Tracy. Crush her like a bug. She has to be stopped." What he is doing is purposefully introducing a new element to this girl's environment and it's not going to be pretty. Tracy goes somewhat crazy to see that not only has Paul joined the race but his sister Tammy Metzler (Jessica Campbell) has joined as well (for very democratic reasons, such as revenge, hatred, and pure loathing of her ex-girlfriends new boyfriend). Are teens this vicious? Yes.