The form of debate showcased in 2007’s high-school forensics flick Rocket Science is probably foreign to anyone who gets his debate fix from the national political stage. Known as policy debate, it’s a speech competition in which teams argue over the same resolution at each event that takes place throughout the school year, and it’s known for the common phenomenon of debaters speaking hundreds of words per minute in order to get their ideas in under the format’s very strict time limits. Rocket Science, featuring a young Anna Kendrick as a high-school debater and Reece Thompson as a boy with a stutter who joins said debate team, is a coming-of-age story that takes a look at the power of debate not just to change minds but also lives.
Fighting Words: [unintelligible]
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8i0Zm9U_fXg]