Where Ben has his heart set on a college scholarship to the school his recently deceased dad went to, Tanner is content to skip college and “wait for climate change to wipe us all out.” They’re an odd couple with wildly different priorities, and nonsensical mayhem is about to ensue. Where Ben wakes up early for a strict morning routine of green juice and triple checking his homework, Tanner sleeps in late and knocks back a days-old energy drink before school. The 41 Best Animated Movies of the 21st Century Ranked 'Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness' Review: Sam Raimi Just Saved the MCU from Itself 'Inbetween Girl' Review: A Scrappy All-American Coming-of-Age Story
But the tired Gen Z tropes and cheesy one liners suck the life out of the rest of the movie. Wheeler, whose slight stature collides playfully with the outsized fear she instills in her students. The outsized caricatures work when it comes to Mrs. Most of “The Prank” revolves around two squeaky-voiced teenagers: floppy-haired overachiever Ben (Connor Kalopsis) and ditzy-but-brilliant slacker Tanner (Ramona Young), broadly sketched types we’ve seen a million times. Moreno is clearly having the time of her life, but unfortunately her juicy performance is the only perk of “The Prank.” Wheeler looks more like a Bond villain in her precise grey bob and black leather gloves.
The 90-year-old EGOT winner has reinvented herself many times over the years, but she dons yet another beguiling disguise as a psychopathic physics teacher in the dark teen comedy “ The Prank.” Her sleek black Cadillac may be an obvious nod to Cruella de Vil, but Moreno’s severe Mrs.
Despite releasing a retrospective documentary about her astounding eight-decade career, Rita Moreno shows no signs of slowing down.