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What a Girl Wants
(Reviewed February 2, 2003)
-
This embarrassingly stupid movie has a plot so predictable, cornball, overused and cliche that it's like something a computer shat.
A teenage bim (Amanda Bynes) plays the daughter of a funky free-spirit single mom (Kelly Preston). Although said mom got knocked up way-back-when by a guy she was madly in love with (Colin Firth), she accommodatingly split the scene--without even discussing the matter with loverboy--after one of his British family's retainers told her that the guy didn't want to see her anymore. She had never bothered to tell the dude that she was preggers, either. I mean, hey, he was only THE GREAT LOVE OF HER LIFE.
When the daughter gets big enough to nicely fill out a bra, the little darling takes off to pay the old "surprise visit" on her unknowing dad. Holy crap, turns out he's running for a seat in Parliament! And she's so wild and fun-loving, all of Britain soon is agog over her crude but charming Yankee ways! And daddy is about to marry a stuck-up social climbing bitch with a nasty daughter, unless he comes to his senses!
The only thing novel about this strictly-for-preteen-girls crapfest is what is surely an unintentional creepy-incest vibe. The "getting to know you" scenes between daughter and dad seem more like romantic interludes, especially because she has a penchant for wearing, shall we say, "form fitting" outfits. (Sadly, though, her face is one of those blank, generically interchangeable "sitcom daughter" mugs that never registers a single honest human emotion during the entire length of the film.)
Avoid, avoid, avoid.
Back Row Grade: D-
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