AllMovie

A girl looking for kicks gets a whole lot more than she bargained for in a singularly curious town in this dark comedy. Caroline Wexler (Kat Dennings) is a clever but cynical 17-year-old whose father is still adjusting to the death of his wife. Caroline's dad takes a new job and they move to a strange community where the sky is always dark thanks to an industrial fire that's been burning for several months and isn't going to be put out anytime soon. Caroline doesn't have much use for her backward drug-addled classmates, and so to relieve her boredom she sets out to seduce Mr. Anderson (Josh Lucas), the best-looking man on the school's faculty. While Mr. Anderson tries to avoid responding to Caroline's blunt sexual overtures, it isn't long before he succumbs to her charms and is sleeping with his new student. But Caroline's new romance turns into a romantic triangle when Thurston (Reece Thompson), one of her stoner classmates, falls head over heels for her and she gives him a chance to impress her. Before long, Thurston is declaring Caroline the love of his life, Mr. Anderson is angry over having a rival for her affections, and the local serial killer begins to make their presence known, picking off the town's teenagers one by one. Also featuring Andie MacDowell and Ted Whittall, Daydream Nation was the first feature film from writer and director Mike Goldbach.