Todd Wiseman Jr.’s stunning feature debut, The School Duel, is a provocative, stomach-churning, and urgent dissection of American religious conservatism, popularism, gun love and a host of twisted ideological interpretations of “one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all”.
Few films are as heartbreaking in their vision, compelling in their dissection of the march toward populism, or visceral in the horror they generate as Todd Wiseman Jr.’s feature debut, The School Duel. Winner of the Canal+ Special 50th Anniversary Jury Prize at the Deauville Film Festival, The School Duel is a gut-wrenching portrait of a dystopian future that feels all too real when watching Republican politicians and MAGA cultists embrace a form of right-wing populism Putin would be proud of. The School Duel is a genuinely outstanding feature directorial debut that leaves an indelible mark.
According to Sandyhook Promise, twelve children die from gun violence across the United States every day, and another thirty-two are shot and injured. Since the Columbine High School shooting in 1999, more than 390,000 students in the United States have experienced gun violence at school, and there were more school shootings in 2022 than in any year since Columbine. Gun violence is an epidemic in the United States, yet gun control remains a dirty word among many who believe gun ownership is an American right that cannot and will not be challenged. The National Rifle Association (NRA) is one of the most powerful political organisations in the U.S., lobbying heavily against all forms of gun control with the backwards argument that gun ownership makes the United States safer while upholding the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, ratified in 1791.
In Florida, lawmakers led by the Republican Governor Ron DeSantis recently passed legislation that could roll back post-Parkland shooting safety measures, lowering the legal age of gun purchase from 21 to 18, in a state where it’s illegal to buy beer until you are 21. The whole debate on gun control in the U.S. is twisted by right-wing religious conservatism, a rise in political populism and a strange notion that freedom, liberty and justice come from the barrel of an AK-47.
The School Duel has this twisted love of guns, denial of the need for gun control, and a march toward far-right populism and evangelical conservatism firmly within its sights. As we enter the grim, religiously controlled and morally corrupt ‘Free State’ of Florida in a not-too-distant future, thirteen-year-old Samuel Miller (Kue Lawrence) suffers a gauntlet of daily ridicule and bullying in a state where violence and toxicity flow through the streets unchecked. As the gentle Sam puts it when talking to his loving mum, “It’s just violence, mum, it’s not like sex or anything.” The social media feeds Sam scrolls through are a hotbed of influencer-led indoctrination, classrooms preach its Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve, sports fields encourage bullying and aggression, and churches preach Christian values while sowing fear and division.
However, most insidious of all in this ‘Free State’ of Florida is a policy introduced by its Governor, played by Oscar Nuñez: zero gun control. Everyone carries a weapon in a state where locals dictate law enforcement, and the possibility of mass school shootings is controlled with an annual event called The School Duel, run by The National Legion, with the slogan “fight the unseen enemy.” In a twisted State with an even more twisted notion of democracy and freedom, the televised and streamed School Duel pits teenagers against teenagers from each school in a fight to the death using an array of guns picked via a giant spinning wheel not dissimilar to a game show like Wheel Of Fortune.
The kids recruited for this sickening spectacle are called ‘volunteers,’ but in reality, they are anything but. They are hand-picked due to their behaviour at school, whether that be their ‘All-American’ credentials or the fact that they are quiet and withdrawn, and could pose a threat to the ‘system’ of social control that Florida prides itself on. At the end of each terrifying tournament, one kid will be announced the ‘king’ (preferably the ‘All-American’ student) whilst the others will give their lives as ‘martyrs.’
Samuel, sick of being a target of bullies and struggling to deal with the death of his dad, who served in the Armed Forces, wants so much to be as strong as the kids who torment him. His mum (Christina Brucato) knows he’s struggling, and does everything she can to protect and support him, but that’s tough in a society of toxic behaviours, dangerous political ideologies and venomous beliefs that see kids encouraged to kill their classmates on TV. So, Sam takes matters into his own hands at school, and in the process draws the attention of Captain Stegmann (Michael Sean Tighe), a recruiter of the Duel on the lookout for martyrs. Sam’s sports coach, played by Jamad Mays, is less convinced by Stegmann’s interest in the young boy, even though it was he who led Stegmann in Sam’s direction.
It’s not long before Stegmann has talked Sam into playing, promising glory, adulation, and an opportunity to make his dad proud. And as for Sam’s mum, well, she doesn’t need to know, as no parent has a say in the selection, as their kids sign their lives away with no parental interference in a state built on apparent Christian values!
Shot almost entirely in stark black and white, with only one sequence dressed in colour – a sequence I am not about to spoil here – Todd Wiseman Jr. captures the sterility, oppression, and violence of Sam’s world in stunning detail. As The School Duel comes into view, Sam already doubts the promises made to him before he signed on the dotted line, but he equally knows that there is no way out of the horrors about to unfold. Armed with an old pair of worn boots that don’t fit him, his dad’s dog tags, and the weapon gleefully selected by the gameshow wheel of death, he knows this could be his final act. Meanwhile, his mum sits imprisoned in her home, where all she can do is watch. She knows Sam is just fresh meat to the adults around him, a sacrifice that needs to be made to maintain a twisted world where adults clear young bodies from a field as a school band plays ‘Yankee Doodle’ for punters.
Central to the visceral power of The School Duel is the outstanding performance of Kue Lawrence as Sam. Lawrence captures Sam’s emotional journey in exquisite detail, from the alienation of his school life, to the brief, misplaced confidence he achieves on being asked to compete, and his truly heartbreaking realisation that he is a mere pawn in a bigger political game as the horror of the ‘Duel’ unfolds. Add to this haunting performance the sheer emotional power of Christina Brucato’s mum and the venom-filled manipulation of Michael Sean Tighe’s Stegmann, and The School Duel becomes a provocative, stomach-churning, and urgent dissection of American religious conservatism, popularism, gun love and a host of twisted ideological interpretations of “one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all”.
Hard to watch, breathtakingly written and directed, and powerfully performed, The School Duel may find itself compared to The Hunger Games or The Purge, but trust me, this is a movie that holds no simple comparisons as it clinically focuses on the adult politics, toxicity and social divide that threatens to consume our kids. And that is what sits at the heart of Wiseman’s terrifying vision of the near future: a society where kids are no longer free to be kids, as the adults around them embrace twisted and morally corrupt ideologies disguised as unity, Christianity, and patriotism that simply consume them and their kids in the name of a ‘faux freedom’ built on manipulation, division and social control.
The School Duel had its Canadian premiere at Fantasia Film Festival and is awaiting a UK premiere date.
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