Review

Review Date: 19-September-10
Spoiler Rating: Medium
Juju Judgment: Just OK

Easy A (2010)

Silly me. Here I thought that most high schoolers were sexually active these days, or at least too cool to raise an eyebrow upon hearing that one of their peers had "done it." But the new teen caper Easy A runs on the premise that one girl's loss of virginity stirs up a hurricane of rumor, surprise, and outrage. Has sex education or the religious right hobbled high school hormones? Or is Hollywood trying to influence teen behavior by depicting it in a certain way? I can't be sure, but in any case Easy A struck me as a fancy that lacks conviction.

I know, the movie is meant to be funny and doesn't deal with your everyday back-seat nooky. The storm begins to blow when Olive (Emma Stone), a girl too independent to be either popular or unpopular, tells her best friend that she slept with a college student. This is a lie designed to silence the friend's exhausting interest, but it is overheard by an outspoken advocate of Jesus and chastity before marriage (Amanda Bynes). Soon everybody knows Olive's supposed (and supposedly dirty) secret. Then, driven by ill winds and a desire to help the downtrodden, Olive becomes the go-to girl for boys who aren't studs but desperately want to appear so. She allows her name to be lasciviously linked to theirs for a fee (gift cards from the major box stores), which hits the grapevine under the heading "Olive is a prostitute." She runs with it, adopting a hooker's wardrobe and even sewing a red "A" on her bustiers à la the classic literary adulteress, Hester Prynne.

This scenario contains sufficient fodder for parody, such as society's simultaneous fascination with and disdain for female sexuality and the snowballing nature of the little white lie. However, the comedy is largely of the brainless variety. Other than the obligatory Dream Guy (Penn Badgley), all the secondary characters are quirky to the extreme. Olive's parents (Patricia Clarkson and Stanley Tucci) are the hippie-yuppie screwball BFFs every modern teen would like in her corner, and they come across as complete rubbish. Adding to the movie's fake quality is the fact that most of the younger actors look too old for high school, including the leading lady. But I make an exception for her. While not exactly captivated by Emma Stone, I appreciate that she doesn't look like every other starlet. She has, in fact, a unique presence that conveys both shrewdness and sensitivity and tempted me to root for Olive. Not that I believe for a second that her problems would vanish by telling the truth (as she does on-line, naturally). This is the least likely part of the tale. Yet I was glad to see Olive's adventures in taboo, phantom sex conclude in a way more easy than otherwise.

Copyright © 2010 The Jujube (M. I. Kim). All rights reserved.