Robert Iscove
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But it does so within the well-defined beats of a personal-transformation narrative, à la She’s All That, and the combination results in a muddied, if arguably more realistic than average, message.
The plot sounds an awful lot like She’s All That, Can’t Buy Me Love, 10 Things I Hate About You, Mean Girls, or even Some Kind of Wonderful, and it would be easy to dismiss sight unseen The DUFF as a copycat/rip-off of high school coming-of-age films from decades past.
It's essentially a combination of various John Hughes movies with a sprinkle of "She's All That."
I recently saw the movie The DUFF, a teen relationship comedy in the vein of She’s All That.
Too bad, it never figures out its own identity, playing dumpy gatekeeper to the likes of Some Kind of Wonderful and She’s All That .
There’s a good message buried in all of this, even if it feels like a rehash of “Mean Girls,” “She’s All That” or any number of high school films from the last four decades.
"She's All That" is basically yet another tale of how clothes make the girl, another brick in the "My Fair Lady"/"Guys and Dolls"/"Pretty in Pink" wall.
A modern take on Pygmalion and My Fair Lady, She’s All That really offers nothing new.
There have been numerous versions of George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion story produced on big and small screens, the most popular of which is probably 1964's My Fair Lady.
Of course it is an unbreakable rule of this formula that the ugly duckling is a swan in disguise: Rachael Leigh Cook is in fact quite beautiful, as was Audrey Hepburn , you will recall, in "My Fair Lady."
Arty outcast learns happiness is wearing lip gloss and dating jocks in pointless teen "Pygmalion"…
(Jan. 29, 1999) -- Take the story of Pygmalion and set it in a hip high school, with the hotshot senior class president as Henry Higgins and an "ugly duckling" art student as his project.
A modern take on Pygmalion and My Fair Lady, She’s All That really offers nothing new.
The romance begins, Pygmalion-style, after Zack makes a bet that he can transform any girl into a prom queen.
There have been numerous versions of George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion story produced on big and small screens, the most popular of which is probably 1964's My Fair Lady.
Just once I'd like to see the "Pygmalion" formula applied to a woman who was truly unattractive.
We know the type of movie this is referring too… Pretty Woman , She’s All That and The Proposal are all examples which spring to mind.
Booksmart (2019)
Directed by Olivia Wilde
influenced by She's All That (1999)
Characters Plot Themes
It is usually the male characters who inject some change into them, be it Zack (Freddie Prinze Jr.) in She’s All That , Patrick (Heath Ledger) in 10 Things I Hate About You or even Oz (Chris Klein) in American Pie .
Booksmart uses plot elements that have been seen countless times before on screen in films from American Graffiti and American Pie to Brat Pack movies and She’s All That , but she approaches them in a fresh and engaging way.
We’ve seen many “booksmart” female characters in other teen films, including Say Anything and She’s All That.
While watching it, I couldn’t help but feel jealous of all the young girls who have this movie to help them get through high school when I only had She’s All That.
…(taken straight out of Humphrey Bogart in The Big Sleep and other movies).
Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982)
Directed by Amy Heckerling
influenced She's All That (1999)
Themes
Be assured, after a decade of razor-sharp Fast Times at Ridgemont High and Heathers movie clones, She's All That is a kinder, gentler tale, a soft and strangely innocent tale for younger, less cynical filmgoers.
But writer/director John Hughes finally hit the mark with Sixteen Candles (1984), The Breakfast Club (1985), and Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986), all of which were funny but earned their laughs through teens' genuine fears, curiosities, and anxieties.
Part "Sixteen Candles," part "Pygmalion," "She's All That" tries to hitch a low-rent ride on the coattails of the "Scream" /"Dawson's Creek" teen profit phenomenon by casting a bunch of C-list teenage actors (who, if they had any integrity, would have passed on this movie and kept their fingers crossed for a douche commercial) in roles that Neve Campbell and even James VanDerBeek (late of "Varsity Blues") wouldn't touch with asbestos gloves.
This latest iteration involves that bickering-friends-turned-lovers trope familiar from Meg Ryan movies ( You’ve Got Mail and When Harry Met Sally ); the matchmaking element from Clueless and The Parent Trap ; and a lovably nerdy female protagonist reminiscent of Josie Geller ( Never Been Kissed ) and Laney Boggs ( She’s All That ).
His attempts at playing hapless are like watching Rachael Leigh Cook playing the unattractive frump in She’s All That.
The last ten years has seen a sporadic continuation of the Hughes-type movies, like Heathers (1989), and Clueless (1995).
Be assured, after a decade of razor-sharp Fast Times at Ridgemont High and Heathers movie clones, She's All That is a kinder, gentler tale, a soft and strangely innocent tale for younger, less cynical filmgoers.
Though this notion may have been more eloquently expressed by John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John in "Grease," it's still not such a bad message.
Then came the musicals, like West Side Story, Rock 'n' Roll High School, and Grease, again with actors who were too old to play high school kids.
To All the Boys I've Loved Before (2018)
Directed by Susan Johnson
influenced by She's All That (1999)
Themes
However, in comparison to teen films such as She’s All That, A Walk to Remember and American Pie , To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before isn’t oversentimental or incredibly fixated on sex or general nakedness.
Movies like She's All That , 10 Things I Hate About You , and Can't Hardly Wait were so ubiquitous that a parody of the genre titled Not Another Teen Movie starring Chris Evans was actually released in 2001.
Ultimately, the fluency with which Johnson, Han, and screenwriter Sofia Alvarez speak “teen rom-com” allows them to take the fizzy conventions of the John Hughes films that Lara Jean loves, mix them all up with the 10 Things I Hate About Yous and the Cluelesses and the She’s All Thats that the outfits and soundtrack and PNW setting invoke, and send all their best bits and pieces through a machine that modernizes those elements even as it sweetens them to pure confection (yes, even the conflicts).
In a subgenre so obsessed with image, Song has not only slowly stripped away the character's defenses, but has crafted a story that is explicitly designed to challenge social norms without resorting to the crassness or triteness of a "Shallow Hal" or "She's All That."
"She's All That" is basically yet another tale of how clothes make the girl, another brick in the "My Fair Lady"/"Guys and Dolls"/"Pretty in Pink" wall.
The film also has a bunch of homages to high school comedies of yore (I clocked tastes of She’s All That, Mean Girls, and 10 Things I Hate About You, while But I’m a Cheerleader is an obvious progenitor), a few cute Easter eggs for anyone older who just loves the genre.
In the 50's, the "juvenile delinquent" genre was invented with movies like Rebel Without a Cause, High School Confidential!, and The Blackboard Jungle,; dramas about troubled kids.
Then came the musicals, like West Side Story, Rock 'n' Roll High School, and Grease, again with actors who were too old to play high school kids.
But writer/director John Hughes finally hit the mark with Sixteen Candles (1984), The Breakfast Club (1985), and Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986), all of which were funny but earned their laughs through teens' genuine fears, curiosities, and anxieties.
Not Another Teen Movie (2001)
Directed by Joel Gallen
influenced by She's All That (1999)
Characters Plot
Its acknowledgment and exaggeration of teen movie staples is reasonably clever, with a plot revolving around Janey Briggs (Chyler Leigh), a hybrid of such characters as Molly Ringwald ’s Pretty In Pink and Sixteen Candles, Julia Stiles ’ in 10 Things I Hate About You and Rachael Leigh Cook ’s in She’s All That.
For an adult, seeing a parody of "She's All That," the 1999 Rachael Leigh Cook/Freddie Prinze romance…