is What A Girl Wants the worst film of the year?

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http://www2.warnerbros.com/whatagirlwants/

ok i know its not really made for me but there was a piece on this film on BBC's Talking Movies show last week which initially centred on how the original posters for the show showing the lead actress giving a bouyant peace sign were removed after being considered an anti-war (thus apparently anti-American) statement. wow indeed.

coupled with this the film itself appears to be fixated on that classic stereotype (having been previously milked dry a few years ago by Friends) that the British (ok, ENGLISH) are a) almost all aristocrats, b) incredibly stuck-up and inept at being able to show affection and have fun. the all-american lead girl travels to England after finding her long-lost father is said stuck-up aristocrat and basically appears to spend the rest of the film showing the stuck-up aristobrits how to let their hair down yadda yadda.

i know this is a tired complaint but just wanted to vent about what the fuck is wrong with Hollywood moguls part 2738...

― stevem (blueski), Tuesday, 22 April 2003 22:52 (twenty-two years ago)

I'm sure it's not... today I saw Malibu's Most Wanted.

― slutsky (slutsky), Tuesday, 22 April 2003 22:54 (twenty-two years ago)

it's only april

― jess (dubplatestyle), Tuesday, 22 April 2003 23:18 (twenty-two years ago)

The Real Cancun looks much much worse.

― Nicole (Nicole), Tuesday, 22 April 2003 23:26 (twenty-two years ago)

nicole wins

("wins")

― jess (dubplatestyle), Tuesday, 22 April 2003 23:28 (twenty-two years ago)

Is it just me or is this film a vague ripoff of Candleshoe, the Jodie Foster film where she's sent to posh english relatives and she's the American tomboy? I mean I havent seen WAGW but it really looks similar. And crap. And the girl-doing-peace-sign thing is still in all the promos in Australia...

― Trayce (trayce), Tuesday, 22 April 2003 23:35 (twenty-two years ago)

yeh it looks like they only changed the poster in the U.S. - but it still makes me wanna rip my clothes off and turn green

― stevem (blueski), Tuesday, 22 April 2003 23:46 (twenty-two years ago)

she's givin' the peace sign on NYC's subways.

― hstencil, Tuesday, 22 April 2003 23:51 (twenty-two years ago)

maybe i heard wrong but i'm sure this show reported the poster had been changed - perhaps just in places like Florida tho.

― stevem (blueski), Tuesday, 22 April 2003 23:54 (twenty-two years ago)

It's been changed in certain markets...

― Spencer Chow (spencermfi), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 00:08 (twenty-two years ago)

storm in a very British teacup eh? typical!

― stevem (blueski), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 00:09 (twenty-two years ago)

The Real Cancun looks much much worse.

Yes, what the FUCK is that all about? Yeesh.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 00:58 (twenty-two years ago)

you can't handle the truth!

― James Blount (James Blount), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 01:06 (twenty-two years ago)

Hahaha i saw this movie. Yes, it makes an awful stereotype about brits, basically like steve said, that they're unaffectionate and boring ..

part where our american heroine tries to hug her grandmother and grandmother says "eep, please dont, im british! we only show affection toward dogs and horses!"

it got a lot of laughs yet I doubt any of the 20 twelve-year olds in the theatre had ever 1) been to england nor 2) know any actual english people.

"malibu's most wanted"--ugh. ugh. i was dumber after seeing this movie.

― Mandee, Wednesday, 23 April 2003 01:13 (twenty-two years ago)

wait until the lisa kudrow-damon wayans 'white people listening rap - WHA-WHA-WHAT?!!!' extravaganzer

― James Blount (James Blount), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 01:16 (twenty-two years ago)

This is a really hot new trend that I hate.

― slutsky (slutsky), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 02:06 (twenty-two years ago)

I know, all the studio's that didn't get to make 8 mile reacted this way I guess

― James Blount (James Blount), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 02:07 (twenty-two years ago)

When I first saw the posters for this flick, I thought the chick was doing the victory sign.

― hstencil, Wednesday, 23 April 2003 02:11 (twenty-two years ago)

the posters in rural Georgia (which is pretty definitely Bush country) still have the peace sign on it so it may be they planned to do it but the backlash prevented it or severely reduced how much they did it.

― James Blount (James Blount), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 02:14 (twenty-two years ago)

I rilly wanna hear more about Malibu's Most.

― Sterling Clover (s_clover), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 05:02 (twenty-two years ago)

I suspect it's the funniest of the bunch

― James Blount (James Blount), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 05:25 (twenty-two years ago)

Umm Steve this movie is actually part of a big trend in the U.S. that goes something like this. Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen have made movies from like ages 0-16; at some point once these movies had become their own little episodic self-supporting industry (like Ernest movies or Home Alone or something), they started doing travel-themed ones, like Mary-Kate and Ashley Go to Rome, Mary-Kate and Ashley Go to Paris, etc. The plot of each one is the same: they go there to visit some adult, say their grandfather who's a diplomat in Italy, and they stir things up with their spunky American youthfulness, and they meet cute and evidently parentless boys who show them around the city and dance politely with them at the end. Also there is some sort of comical adult problem usually involving a bumbling schemer -- you know, typical Disney live-action formula, like the "Small Child and Pet Monkey Foil Bank Robbery / Ingenious Pully Step Launches Robbers Hilariously into Giant Cake / Frosting-Fight Erupts among Stuffy Adults at Gala" kind of thing.

Anyway so they're actually marketing these things for theaters now, hence What A Girl Wants and company. (The girl in it actually used to have a Nickelodeon older-kids show that I accidentally watched once, long story.) My point with all of this is that this pre-teen / early-teen girl travel movie market turns out to be mostly about educating children by offering them, umm, cute broad It's a Small World stereotypes of what other countries are like, which I find absolutely fascinating. Fascinating because it's not as if they even purport to be realistic depictions of other nations, just very simple fantasies: the message is less "this is what these countries are like" and more "just so you know, we have stereotypes about these countries that you should be vaguely familiar with."

But more realistically it's also this: the movies are basically meant to be American pre-teen fantasies of what it would be like to visit these places, and since an untravelled American pre-teen is understandable bound to have very broad and stereotypical ideas of what a given place is like -- and be, in the movie-fantasy context, not really interested in dull "learning" about what they're really like -- the films have to step down and offer the fantasies that match their already-existing fantasies.

Ach, do the films make the kids or do the kids make the films? Anyway, it's interesting. For what it's worth, I don't think American pre-teen fantasy approximations of what America is like are all that much less stereotyped or more realistic than the travelling ones! The Mary-Kate and Ashley Join the Swim Team movie is just as hackneyed and vague as the Mark-Kate and Ashley in Rome one. Why in hell have I seen these things???

― nabisco (nabisco), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 06:01 (twenty-two years ago)

(Actually I know perfectly well: it's because Nory has much younger sisters and will flip channels and say things like "oh this is the one where Mary-Kate and Ashley go to Egypt, it's really good.")

― nabisco (nabisco), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 06:05 (twenty-two years ago)

i dunno i think they really target the British and French in this certain way that is just totally contemptible and serve absolutely no use to young people. isnt this a reason why there's also a stereotype for spoilt American gap-year kids travelling around Europe complaining about how stupid the money is, how unfriendly the people are, how little sense they make etc.?

― stevem (blueski), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 12:24 (twenty-two years ago)

Upcoming Attractions: the Lizzie McGuire Movie, wherein a normal American teenage girl while on a trip to Rome is briefly mistaken by a popstar for his ex-girlfriend/partner. He then falls for her and she fits into the professional and maybe the romantic role.

Blame for this: The Princess Diaries, for my money.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 12:37 (twenty-two years ago)

funny thing is, i didnt complain about King Ralph all those years ago - i liked that film. but it didnt quite play to the stereotypes THAT badly...at least no more on the Brits than the Americans too. and the Royal Family ARE stuck-up and unaffectionate of course ;) so it was okay.

― stevem (blueski), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 12:39 (twenty-two years ago)

They removed the peace signs in all the newspaper ads, digitally putting her hand on her hip. As noted above, she's still rocking that peace thing on the NY subways, though. Oh, and in the subways, the implicit question of what a girl wants is usually answered. Wittily, every time.

― Hurlothrumbo (hurlothrumbo), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 12:40 (twenty-two years ago)

When I was in Rome I kept running into location shoots for the Lizzie McGuire movie. This is something I hope to tell my grandkids.

― slutsky (slutsky), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 15:19 (twenty-two years ago)

(in 50 years or something)

― slutsky (slutsky), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 15:19 (twenty-two years ago)

"Accidently" watched? Ha.

― rosemary (rosemary), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 16:01 (twenty-two years ago)

So many movies I've seen fall into that category.

― slutsky (slutsky), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 16:08 (twenty-two years ago)

I blame Gidget.

Dreamcatcher is the worst movie I've seen so far this year. Worst Stephen King movie ever, most deceptive trailer ever.

― Arthur (Arthur), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 16:38 (twenty-two years ago)

Nadgers. Because the tres-cool animated Matrix short is supposed to be playing before it.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 16:49 (twenty-two years ago)

I almost went to see "Dreamcatcher" for the simple novelty value of aliens shooting out of people's asses. Sanity quickly asserted itself.

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 17:01 (twenty-two years ago)

I kind of want to see Dreamcatcher. I know not why.

― slutsky (slutsky), Wednesday, 23 April 2003 23:47 (twenty-two years ago)

The awesome anal leakage scenes, surely.

― Arthur (Arthur), Thursday, 24 April 2003 00:04 (twenty-two years ago)

Yeah, I must have spring fever or something.

― slutsky (slutsky), Thursday, 24 April 2003 00:09 (twenty-two years ago)

I am so impressed. I love you all.

― 4mateurist (amateurist), Thursday, 24 April 2003 00:13 (twenty-two years ago)

You mean England is real country?!?!?

― fortunate hazel (f. hazel), Thursday, 24 April 2003 00:30 (twenty-two years ago)

most deceptive trailer ever

Yeah, I remember thinking, "Man, this might actually be good, the trailer looks wonderfully unsettling." Then I read some descriptions of what actually happens in the film. Jesus H. This review has a couple of good lines on the matter.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 24 April 2003 00:50 (twenty-two years ago)

I don't remember if Ghostship came out this year or last but it was horrible. I honestly cannot think of a worst movie, from any year. Ghostship is the number one worst movie of the year if it was released in 2003 with Dreamcatcher being number two. Dreamcatcher will assume the role of worst movie if Ghostship was indeed a 2002 tragedy. Is it just me or did the anal-alien-monster-things look like snakey-vaginas with teeth?

― Lindsey B, Friday, 25 April 2003 02:40 (twenty-two years ago)

So. Malibu's Most Wanted. I mean, using "Play That Funky Music, White Boy" to sell this movie. Genius or what?

How bad is it?

The Real Cancun is about exactly what you think it's about, Ned. Nothing more, nothing less.

― Matt Maxwell (Matt M.), Friday, 25 April 2003 02:52 (twenty-two years ago)

I haven't seen it, but Amanda Vines in the Amanda show is awesome.

― A Nairn (moretap), Friday, 25 April 2003 02:58 (twenty-two years ago)

That's funny, I was just going to bring up Ghost Ship. It was very very poor and very laughably bad all around. But it had a really great & scary opening scene, I thought.

I don't know if I'm ready to talk about Malibu's Most Wanted. I think I sort of blocked out ever seeing it.

― slutsky (slutsky), Friday, 25 April 2003 03:28 (twenty-two years ago)

nabisco don't feel bad. I have actually watched most of the Olsen movies voluntarily. You are speaking of the "Our Lips are Sealed" ( them a witness protection program in Australia), "Winning London" (they are Model UN'ers in London), HOliday in the Sun (basically just going Bahamas), Passport to Paris (visiting their ambassador uncle) and When in Rome (I have not seen yet) whole Gidgety vibe of young girl goes to foreign country.

― Carey (Carey), Friday, 25 April 2003 13:20 (twenty-two years ago)

Please tell me the Bahamian one was soundtracked by the Sex Pistols.

― amateurist (amateurist), Friday, 25 April 2003 13:49 (twenty-two years ago)

i'm in this film!!!

― pete b. (pete b.), Friday, 25 April 2003 14:35 (twenty-two years ago)

But it had a really great & scary opening scene

...which happened to be very similar to Cube's pre-title sequence.

― Frühlingsmute (Wintermute), Friday, 25 April 2003 16:13 (twenty-two years ago)

I haven't seen Cube. Was the Ghost Ship opening a total bite?

― slutsky (slutsky), Friday, 25 April 2003 16:24 (twenty-two years ago)

Pretty much. It's the same slicing -> double take -> falling apart sequence, except it's just one man and he gets cut into cubes, not in half.

― Frühlingsmute (Wintermute), Friday, 25 April 2003 16:39 (twenty-two years ago)

>The girl in it actually used to have a Nickelodeon older-kids show that I accidentally watched once, long story.

That reminds me of an Onion article about the local hipster who makes long, contrived excuses for being seen at the mall (I would like to hear the story though).

>I haven't seen it, but Amanda Vines in the Amanda show is awesome.

Its Amamda Bynes. And that show was horrible. Nickleodeon has gone to shit.

― fletrejet, Friday, 25 April 2003 16:47 (twenty-two years ago)

i watch mandamandamanda show on purpose all day.

she should do straight up slapstick flicks.

― brian badword (badwords), Saturday, 26 April 2003 05:36 (twenty-two years ago)

Upcoming Attractions: the Lizzie McGuire Movie, wherein a normal American teenage girl while on a trip to Rome is briefly mistaken by a popstar for his ex-girlfriend/partner

passing a poster for this on the street the other day I swear I thought it said The Lizzie Grubman Movie, which God knows would be far more fucking entertaining

― M Matos (M Matos), Saturday, 26 April 2003 05:48 (twenty-two years ago)

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