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Review

A Cinderella Story

Director

Mark Rosman

Year

2004

Rating

Reviewed by

Gon Curiel a.k.a. Groucho

Review date

Tuesday, September 28, 2004

I went to the movies on a Sunday morning with my mom expecting to watch The Bourne Supremacy, and found out we’d been misled by the newspaper, as there wasn’t a show for that movie until hours later. We then chose A Cinderella Story, the only option at hand, which didn’t sound like such a bad idea since I’m something of a nut for Hilary Duff, but still, didn’t seem like the kind of film I would go to the movies to watch. Indeed, it shouldn’t be a film anyone aside from preteen girls should go to the movies to watch. And yet, I had a great time watching it.

The story is indeed that of Cinderella, only updated, and acknowledging the existence of the aforementioned fairytale. It tells the tale of Sam (Duff), an orphan, whose dead father didn’t leave a will, so now her stepmother inherited everything he owned. Now Sam is treated as a near-servant while her two step-sisters, Brianna (Madeline Zima) and Gabriella (Andrea Avery), live the good life. It’s not that bad for Sam though, except it doesn’t really look like she’ll be able to go to Princeton, which is her dream, and besides, being a “diner girl” sucks every bit of possible popularity out of her.

Soon it turns out Sam’s got a pen pal she met at a Princeton chat room, who studies, coincidentally, at the same High School, and also fears his college dreams won’t be fulfilled. This is Austin (Chad Michael Murray), the most popular guy in school. Both Austin and Sam want to meet, though they don’t know each other’s identities, so they setup their encounter at the Halloween homecoming dance. Things go askew as she has to run at midnight (to prevent her step-mother’s anger) and he never finds out who she really is, though he falls hopelessly in love with her. Finding her cell phone which she accidentally left behind, he begins a quest to find his Cinderella. But she soon wonders if he’ll accept her if he finds out who she really is.

To some, the fact that this film mingles the well-known fairytale storyline with the average teen film formula is unforgivable. I’m not sure I think the same way. It’s decidedly not a great film, and certainly not a very original one, but it’s clever enough to make the farfetched premise believable, and is filled with earnest performances that make it work. The real problem is the characters aren’t too deep, in fact most are caricatures, and the film soon takes a self-parody path that’s not exactly convenient for it. When we finally get some real drama, it doesn’t really work, because it’s been played so safe so far. But still, there are elements that make us smile, and laugh, and walk out of the theater having had a good time. I think that’s what counts in this case.

As I said, the performances are earnest, and also quite funny. Duff is good at playing slapstick mixed with drama, and Coolidge, as her step-mother, excels at that as well. Dan Byrd as Sam’s best friend, Julie Gonzalo as Austin’s bitchy girlfriend, and Regina King as a sort of fairy godmother, are all good. But the standout for me was Zima, whom I hadn’t seen since “The Nanny”: She’s perfectly credible and funny in her white-trash role as one of the step-sisters.

If to some it counts, the underage members of the audience in my theater spent the whole film laughing out loud and even crying in the end. That must mean something. Don’t go to watch this one... But don’t run away from it either.

“Don’t let the fear of striking out keep you from playing the game.”

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