Assassination of a High School President stars Reece Thompson (Rocket Science, Smallville), as Bobby Funke (pronounced Funk, although everyone around him mispronounces it Funky), a nobody who writes for his high school paper (if you call never finishing or turning in a story "writing," that is).
The school, St. Donovan's Catholic High, has the typical class system in place — jocks, Queen Bee, and Big Man On Campus (BMOC) on top, and kids like Funke on the bottom. Even Funke’s journalistic-minded classmates don't seem to care for him too much.
But when the paper’s editor, Clara (Melonie Diaz, Lords of Dogtown), assigns Funke to profile senior class president and resident stud Paul Moore (Patrick Taylor), things start to change. For starters, during a school basketball game, a stack of completed SATs are stolen from the office of Principal Kirkpatrick (Bruce Willis).
While Kirkpatrick rounds up the usual suspects, Queen Bee (and girlfriend of the beloved BMOC) Francesca Fachini (Mischa Barton, The Sixth Sense, The O.C.) approaches Funke and asks him to start his own "investigation." Channeling Nancy Drew, Funke starts digging around to figure out who stole the tests. When all fingers neatly point to Moore, the tables turn, and Funke becomes accepted, even popular, and even scores the arm of his beloved Francecsa. But the more things go his way, the more Funke questions why, and starts to question everyone around him.
Director Brett Simon and screenwriters Tim Calpin and Kevin Jakubowski do an adequate job utilizing the talent they are given to work with, the only caveat being that Francesca’s role takes up a huge chunk of the story (sadly, Barton is not the best actress of her generation), and the extremely talented and funny Michael Rapaport (Prison Break, My Name is Earl) and Willis are severely underutilized.
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