(courtesy of Fox Searchlight Pictures)
Hola y que tal. Guess what? I'm baaaaaaack!!!
Okay, after a very long and even painful couple of weeks; I am very happy to report that your 'cub' reporter has nicked a few of his major problems in the bud. I'll be blogging on a few of the venues, events and even movies that I go to or see and ecrtainly hope to the Almighty that you are reading them. First up...my review of Drew Barrymore's directorial debut. It seems Ms. Barrymore and her star, 'Juno's' Ellen Page, haved 'whipped' up a winner!
Page (in a somewhat nicer version of the more acerbic and off-puttin 'Juno' character) plays a Texas teen named Bliss Anderson who is literally forced by her mother's sad decree to enter every beauty pageant imaginable, despite her objections. Her mother is played by the incomparable, Oscar-winning actress Marcia Gay Harden who plays a more toned-down version of Sissy Spacek's mother in 'Carrie', but without the Biblethumping. Clearly, Bliss is too square a peg to even fit in these pretty, round holes, so on a trip to Austin, she finds her calling...all-female roller derby.
Though not having been on skates for quite a while, eventually she gets the hang of it and impresses her teammates, and even catches the ire of a rival (played wonderfully by Juliette Lewis in a rare performance), and even finds a potential boyfriend (Landon Pigg), until [ahem] she's caught by her mom, her true age is called into question and even loses her love interest to the same 80's glam rock band T-Shirt she was wearing. Oh yeah, and she has to appear in a pageant that's (wouldn'tcha know it???!) on the same day as the big game. What's a rebellious teenage roller derby girl with moxie to do?
Face it, folks; we all love an underdog story and 'Whip It' provides us with a good one. True, the movie's themes have been done to death before and yeah, there's no sign of the Devo song that should be accompanying this; but still, the film's a breath of fresh air and never once feels false. Barrymore directs her cast and herself with plenty of assurance and even takes a backseat to much of the action, opting to focus solely on Page, who is once again in rebel mode, but is a lot more likeable than that last incarnation (The film 'Juno' was loved by many, but not me). Shauna Cross does a fine job of scripting from her young adult novel
'Derby Girl' and in the end, we end up rooting...and yes, even caring about all of the characters.
Next time, buy the rights to the Devo song, so we can hear it at some point; even in closing credits.
