“Somewhere between a black romantic comedy and a psychosexual horror show, it’s a film so delightfully bratty that it could be easy to miss what lies beneath… The Rules of Attraction brims with doomed yearning.” – The Guardian

RIP James Van Der Beek. While he embodied the sensitive hunk archetype on beloved teen soap opera Dawson’s Creek and in the football drama Varsity Blues, Van Der Beek went fully against type in Roger Avary’s deliriously stylish adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis’ nihilistic cult novel THE RULES OF ATTRACTION. Forget everything you thought you knew about Dawson Leery and higher education. Making his directorial debut, Avary, the Oscar-winning co-writer of Pulp Fiction, takes you back to school and drops you in the middle of the drugged-out, sexed-up lives of (fictional) Camden College’s most disaffected students. Van Der Beek plays Sean Bateman, a womanizing drug dealer whose quest for some kind of connection brings him face-to-face with Lauren (Shannyn Sossamon), a shy girl looking for love but saving herself for the much sought after Victor (Kip Pardue) while Paul Denton (Ian Somerhalder) wants to make a connection of his own…with Sean. With a kitted-out visual style that employs split screens, in-your-face montage, and too-cool-for-school needle drops, THE RULES OF ATTRACTION is fast-paced and funny even when its characters’ lives are spinning out of control. Roger Avary and Bret Easton Ellis may not have exactly covered themselves in glory over the past couple decades, but this darkly funny satire of life, love and the pursuit of debauchery remains a compellingly fatalistic plunge into the deep end of depravity as well as an impeccable time capsule of early-’00s fads and fashions.

To fully celebrate Van Der Beek (as well as his millennial-icon co-stars Katie Holmes, Joshua Jackson, and Michelle Williams), we’ll be presenting the full pilot episode of Dawson’s Creek before the film, starting at 6:15 pm. Doors open at 6 pm.

Arkadin does not generally provide advisories about subject matter or potentially triggering content in films, as sensitivities vary from person to person. However, we encourage researching titles to determine if a screening may contain content that could be upsetting to you. Please feel free to contact us for guidance on specific films. Information about content can also be found on Common Sense Media, IMDB and DoesTheDogDie.com, as well as through general internet searches.