Tell me if you’ve heard this one before… a high school girl is not allowed to join a certain club because it is boys only, so she dresses up like a (transvestite) boy to sneak into the club and prove that she has girl power!
Seriously, how many times can Hollywood make the exact same movie, before somebody sues somebody for copyright infringement? I understand the argument that each new generation of teens will pay big bucks to see the same crappy movie that has been made every couple of years for generations, but come on. Does nobody have any artistic integrity left?
Of course, the whole thing started with William Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night, about a woman who poses as a man to obtain a certain position. This same idea of a girl dressing up like a boy to gain something has shown up everywhere from Academy Award winner Shakespeare in Love to the Disney Channel’s Motorcrossed to a blatant rip-off of an equally bad film called Just One of the Guys from the 80’s.
Audio
The film’s audio track is mixed loud, but there’s no substance to it. It is clear that this was created with the teen girl in mind. It is loud enough that viewers should be able to clearly hear everything through their everyday television speakers. The problem when listening through a home theater setup, however, is that everything, from dialog to the score to ambient cues, is mixed loudly. The result is a soundtrack that has much the same effect as a group of girls talking over lunch. Sound comes from everywhere, but it doesn’t give the viewer any room to listen. It’s just as well. I listened to some of the dialog, and it turns out that I wasn’t missing much anyway.
Video
The video is basically good, with one major problem; halos. The color is good (though a bit on the red side), the black levels are impressive and there are no problems with grain to speak of. But those halos… oh my, what an annoying mess! The outline of every face and major prop bleeds out and onto the background, creating a halo effect that plagues the entire film. The good news is, watching all the video defects gives you something to do instead of watching the movie itself.
Special Features
There are quite a few extras here, but like the film itself, they are short on quality. I was surprised to find that while there is just one commentary listed on the box, there are actually two commentaries included on the disc. The director and cast commentary is actually pretty entertaining simply because there are so many people included on it. The second track features the writer and producer team, and is much more bland and droll. Also included on the commentary menu is a trivia track that talks some about the production decisions, as well as providing some pointless facts such as the definition of the word “hazing” and the name of that fly Shaggy song playing on the jukebox.
Other extras include a cast photo album, a music video and the film’s theatrical trailer. There is also a making-of featurette that is actually pretty well done. You know, except for the fact that the creators have somehow convinced themselves that making this horrible film was a good idea. A second featurette focuses on the cast, and is clearly an electronic press kit segment.
The whole thing wraps up with a set of eight deleted scenes with optional commentary and the token “not at all funny” gag reel. There is certainly nothing wrong with the number of extras on this disc, it’s just a shame they weren’t for a different movie.
Conclusion
I can’t believe that Vinnie Jones and David Cross are in this movie. How does that kind of thing happen? It seems like in every one of these teen movies, some entirely inappropriate actor shows up. It’s even worse in this move, when you see just how flat the acting is from the rest of the cast. For instance, when Amanda Bynes’ character is a boy, he has a redneck accent. Why? It’s totally and completely incoherent. Apparently somebody thought that “teen movie” meant “high school acting talent”.
