Susan Granger’s review of “Bratz” (Lionsgate Films)
If Barbie had ever made the transition to the big screen, I’d like to think she’d have done it with more class than this live-action feature based on the popular fashion floozies.
As the ‘tweener’ story goes, Yasmin (Nathalia Ramos), Jade (Janel Parrish), Sasha (Logan Browning) and Cloe (Skyler Shaye) are “BFF” – Best Friends Forever. Inseparable, they’ve always supported each other but now they’re faced with the new social scene at Carry Nation High. (The school name must be some kind of an inside joke because the REAL Carrie Nation (1846-1911), a staunch member of the temperance movement, battling against alcohol in pre-Prohibition days, was a large woman – nearly six feet tall and weighing 175 pounds – definitely not Bratz chic.)
Anyway, the quartet is appalled by the peer pressure exerted by the insidious clique culture, as enforced by Meredith Baxter Dimly (Chelsea Staub), whose father is the uptight Principal (Jon Voight). According to the press notes, they learn “how true empowerment means standing up for your friends, being true to oneself and living out one’s dreams and aspirations.” Hah!
In the less-than-capable hands of screenwriters Susan Estelle Jansen (“The Lizzie McGuire Movie”), Adam De La Pena and David Eilenberg and director Sean McNamara, it’s really an incoherent paean to mall materialism, cloaked in ethnic diversity, lifting liberally from “Mean Girls,” “Election,” “Clueless” and “Raise Your Voice” – although the inclusion of a Mariachi band at the breakfast table, along with Laine Kazan, is an original touch.
Yet the message is definitely mixed – like, while it’s great to be athletic, it’s even better in stiletto heels. On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Bratz” is an “awesomely” tacky 2. And since when did high school freshmen start to look like college seniors?
