"Bullied" (aka, "Rock Sugar") was a perplexing film. One strand of the film focused on the bullying of young Charlotte Tan at school. Another addressed an even more troubling situation for her at home. The two elements of the film never completed meshed.

In the school part of the story, it was not convincing that Charlotte would nearly be suspended from school after she was on the receiving end of bullying from Brenda. There was also a clear racial animus against her by her classmates. The clueless vice-principal never gave Charlotte the opportunity to tell her side of the story. And, while Charlotte's father was somewhat sympathetic, her mother simply took the word of the school administrator at face value.

On the home front, the Tans have guests for Christmas with Aunt Janice and Uncle Mark arriving for a stay. It turns out that Uncle Mark is a pervert, and Charlotte heroically recuses her nemesis Brenda as Mark is about to assault her. This was a lot to ask of a 12-year-old over the Christmas holidays!

The bizarre sequence in which Charlotte seems to accidentally kill Brenda, who mysteriously rises from the dead like Lazurus, lacked credibility. Still, the strength of the film was in the outstanding performances of the cast members.

While all the pieces did not fit together, the filmmakers had a degree of success in dramatizing the ordeals that young people may go through both in the area of bullying by their peers and dysfunction within their families at home.