''Rules of Attraction'' is a must-see for fall 2002
Rules of AttractionWHY WE CAN'T WAIT First there are the hyperactive trailers with shots of boy-next-door Dawson (James Van Der Beek) smashing up a pay phone, ''Seventh Heaven'' bad girl Jessica Biel seducing a banana, and a stoned Fred Savage in tighty-whities. Then there's the early version of the movie poster -- since scrapped -- that demonstrated the many positions of the Kama Sutra...using Beanie Babies. This might be just the thing to break the typecast teens (Biel, Shannyn Sossamon, and ''Dawson's Creek'''s Van Der Beek and Ian Somerhalder) out of their squeaky-clean molds.
SOURCE MATERIAL The novel by Bret Easton Ellis -- the same man whose work was translated into 2000's creepy-fun ''American Psycho'' and the '80s sleeper ''Less Than Zero.''
PLOT POINTERS ''Rules of Attraction'' is to ''the real college experience'' as ''Apocalypse Now'' was to ''the real Vietnam experience.'' Gruesomely accurate...and then some.
BURNING QUESTION Will Van Der Beek turn in a performance equal to those of past Ellis creeps Robert Downey Jr. (''Less Than Zero'') and Christian Bale (''American Psycho'')?
COME FOR '90s TV icon Van Der Beek
STAY FOR '80s TV icon Savage
