Where is John Hughes when a generation of teens need someone to supply them with films that do not constitute mental abuse? This tween concoction is a collection of caricatures taped together with clichés.
It’s the summer before Julie Corky (Alexa Vega, SPY KIDS) begins her freshman year in high school. She wants nothing more than to sit at the fountain during lunch instead of the tables by the dumpsters and date the school’s skateboarding, prep hunk Steve Phillips (Sean Faris, who was 22 when he made this film and sure looks it, YOURS, MINE AND OURS).
To celebrate the end of the junior high, Julie is having a sleepover, inviting her best friend Hannah (Mika Boorem, HEARTS IN ATLANTIS), bubbly Farrah (Scout Taylor-Compton, TV’s CHARMED) and blonde, socialite Stacie (Sara Paxton, AQUAMARINE), who skips the silly sleepover because she’s going to the high school dance with Todd (Thad Luckinbill, JUST MARRIED). Julie replaces Stacie with the heavy girl Yancy (Kallie Flynn Childress, TARGET). Julie’s mom Gabby (Jane Lynch, BEST IN SHOW) still treats her like she’s a little girl and her father Jay (Jeff Garlin, TV’s CURB YOUR ENTHUSIASM) is your typical clueless film dad that supplies needed plot devices and comic relief when needed.
When Stacie challenges Julie and her friends to a scavenger hunt, Julie enlists the help of her idiotic brother Ren (Sam Huntington, SUPERMAN RETURNS) to sneak out of the house. Julie and her friends are continually followed by a group of spastic skateboarding boys lead by Russell (Evan Peters, TV’s PHIL OF THE FUTURE) and relentless rent-a-cop Sherman (Steve Carell, THE 40-YEAR-OLD VIRGIN).
Even the presence of the hilarious Carell cannot save this mindless sitcom of stupidity. Not a single character in this film approaches a real human being or avoids being a walking cliché. The men are worse off, made to act way, way over-the-top in a sad attempt to force some humor into this ABC Family reject. Faris doesn’t have to do anything but look hot.
The screenplay is so inept that it asks us to suspend all disbelief that these characters are not mentally challenged, because that would make the film actually sad. What friggin’ high school has lunch tables by the dumpsters? Health code anyone? And lets not even get into the potential conflicts in the scene where the girls have to get their teacher to buy them a drink at a club and photograph it. Or the mission to get Sean’s boxers — why commit breaking and entering when there is no proof needed that the boxers are actually from Sean? The same amount of thoughts in these characters’ minds are the same amount that went into writing the screenplay — none.
If this wasn’t enough, the film actually offended me. In an effort to say to young girls it’s okay to be heavy, Farrah tells Yancy that she shouldn’t worry that regular guys don’t talk to her and needs to find a guy who likes brownies over celery like her. So what the film is saying is “hey fatty, stick to your species.” Ugh. In that sub-plot, my thoughts of the whole movie are summed up. This mindless confection thinks it’s all about girl power, but ends up being an infomercial for the message that “social status is everything” — something it thinks it’s fighting against.
Rick DeMott
Animation World Network
Creator of Rick's Flicks Picks
