88) 10 Things I Hate About YouDirector: Gil JungerYear: 1999Plot Summary: Popular, pretty Bianca Stratford is in dilemma. A family rule forbids her from dating until her unpopular, rebellious, boy-hating older sister Kat gets a suitor of her own. In an attempt to win Bianca, a potential boyfriend desperately attempts to set Kat up with Patrick Verona, another rebel who may just be able to win Kat's heart.
The very definition of a guilty pleasure.
On any normal occasion, I'd avoid an American high school based teenage comedy like Margaret Thatcher on her time of the month. However, 10 Things I Hate About You is the one exception to that rule.
For a start, at least 10 Things I Hate About You has a good bash at trying to be a bit different from the rest of the pack. While these kinds of movies tend to rehash the same stereotypical characters over and over again, this one doesn't conform to the cliches but rather plays on them in a tongue-in-cheek fashion. It takes an almost satyrical insight into life inside an American high school and the people who attend it. Furthermore, the incredible cast, featuring the awesome Joseph Gordon Levitt and the sorely missed Heath Ledger, help the characters rise above their stereotypes and breathe life into them.
Moreover, the usually simplistic, terrible and cliched writing that's synonymous with this genre of picture is replaced in 10 Things I Hate About You by some sharp dialogue. Unlike most writers who have tried their hand at American high school movie, it never feels like they are trying to make it overly hip or cool. I mean, let's compare this dialogue such as "Has the fact that you're completely psycho managed to escape your attention?" to Twilight's "Cute, Mike. Let a playa play!" Also, aside from a handful of slapstick gags that don't work, the humour is genuinely very witty and smart.
This modern retelling of Shakespeare's The Taming Of The Shrew is fresh, funny, unconventional and, while I'll never love the film, I'd be lying if I didn't say that it's a throughly entertaining movie that is so easy to watch.
3/5
3 comments:
Hah. Though I <3 Levitt forever and always.
I did watch my guilty pleasure movie of (kind of) this genre the other day; The Girl Next Door.
Never seen it but I guess I will have to check it out now that you've said that. :P Haha. I think everyone has a teenage rom com that they hate to admit they love. This one's mine. :) This and a bit of Take That would be my ultimate guilty pleasure night.
Hahahah. Well. The Girl Next Door is pretty standard, perhaps cliche, but it does a good job of hiding all the potential exposition from any dialogue that most films of this genre are criminals of out of sheer laziness and, well, knowing their audience too well, haha. Love the cast with Emile Hirsch, Timothy Olyphant, Paul Dano and the very fine Elisha Cushburt. Plus the soundtrack, while pretty obvious, is really quite impressive for a film like this, and when I saw it when I was like 12 or 13, it introduced me to The Who's Baba O Riley, Queen's Under Pressure and Donovan's Atlantis among others.
But hey, I'm just giving you the frame of mind to watch it in. I'll admit it's nothing special but - guilty pleasure, right. ;)
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