Girl (1998)

Poor old RavenGlamDVDCollector cannot get further than the downloaded trailer, which I got to after doing research on Dominique Swain and TART. Took one look and instantly saw that it had a CLUELESS Alicia Silverstone vibe and I was more than hooked, I was being reeled in. But when I found it after a long struggle (searching for "GIRL" at my supplier brought more than 660 hits, from THE GIRL NEXT DOOR to GOSSIP GIRL to quite every girl in the New York phone guide, but I zoomed in by searching "Dominique Swain") the price caused all my elation to fade. In my country, you can buy a second-hand motorcycle for that price. My review is therefore based on the trailer alone, and is merely here because I want to have my say about a movie I didn't even know about until yesterday afternoon, but will take up a lot of my time in the months to follow, as I will constantly monitor for a price drop. This morning, looking at the trailer again, noticed it was even more of a MY SO-CALLED LIFE ambiance, and Dominique really mimics Claire Danes most winsomely. With the hook in deep, the buzz for this is as high with me as the chances of getting to it properly is low, so bear with me if the review is as stale as days-old bread. Oh to be as fortunate as to waft on indignantly about it as some of you privileged lot out there in Civilization. Find a little-known 1998 title in our struggling, floundering video-rent stores? Snowball's chance in hell on a summer's day with no umbrella. The big draw-card for me is the intentional CLUELESS/MY SO-CALLED LIFE vibe. It's hilarious and draws me to it like a bee is drawn to honey. I loved Dominique Swain in the remake of LOLITA, and I'm really long overdue to see her in something else. Here she is very cute, so cute that I can only say that she must be miscast, as any girl THAT PRETTY would know she is THAT PRETTY and not need friends to tell her she is sexy for GIRLS HAVE MIRRORS, you know, and that one has a very lucky mirror. But the appeal to me lies in the Cher Horovich/Angela Chase speech patterns, I more than loved CLUELESS and MY SO-CALLED LIFE, and they were two of my all-time favorite characters. Throw in Tara Reid and this can only be a truckload of fun.Addendum, 20 December 2015. I just downloaded the first ten minutes, thank you VuClip!While the trailer promises a bright, funny chick, the movie, judged by its first ten minutes, appears disappointingly dull, like it's got no beating heart, like key elements are there, but not a trace of spark. Aneamic. Believe me, this isn't sour grapes at all. I might never obtain this title, I monitor the price daily, going "Christmas! Bah! Humbug!" and am hoping for a reprieve on which I would act, but this strategy might not work. Anyway, movie itself now seems truly bleak, but Dominique's fault it certainly wasn't. Note to producers: Yes, a pretty girl is a must-have ingredient, but don't forget the ZING! You need to add oodles of ZING and CHARM. Then you get MAGIC. And fill theaters and sell DVDs (at normal prices! and making even more bucks!) - A fanatic collector's lament.For anybody who do not understand what I am on about, witness the trailer on VuClip, and then the 10 minute clip. The difference is marked. Sadly. It's like a cake falling flat. A cake-mix that has lots of very good ingredients, yummy-delicious, in it.Ironically, I got my titular wish granted without the actual DVD. :({since been obtained, at sky-high cost}Addendum, 19 October 2016. The movie proved to be a whole lot more popular with me than that download made it appear. Everything is better on a big screen. The famous (well, with me anyway) trailer also appears on the DVD, and I can just look at it and smile warmly. Even though the picture has its flaws, I think Dominique Swain is just the prettiest thing well me being me, I shouldn't say the prettiest thing ever... But most definitely one of the foremost contenders for that title. As far as I'm concerned. You'd notice heavily-laden sour grapes if you'd wade through the other reviews here. An hour-and-a- half commercial for Noxzema, hell, gee, I can just see the bitter ol' thing who wrote that one. I mean, I feel your pain, us lesser mortals live in the Ugly Tree, huh? Be warned that Dominique Swain in this movie is absolutely, absolutely 100% enough to cause a total onslaught of envy. Wow, think what pals you could be with a mirror if you looked like that one!Similarities with those two names I mentioned back in the beginning: Enough for me to say that the producers were obviously influenced by MY SO-CALLED LIFE and CLUELESS. Down to Andrea writing with a marabou-feathered (very cumbersome!) pen, like Cher in CLUELESS. And when Tara Reid's character first appeared, I yelled out to myself: A.J. Langer!As for the story itself, of course it doesn't live up to my initial expectations. But they were on to something real real real good, and with a lead as pretty as Dominique, I could just beg for more, should have been a TV series. The way she lights up the screen in that scene where she first hears Todd sing... glam magic movie history. I'm just done for. Stick a fork in me, to quote a line.If The Raven could have hooked up with a movie character, anyone of his choice, taking into account beauty + personality, = Andrea Marr.

First off,I have to say that i enjoyed the book. This however, is trash. The acting was so bad it was painful to watch. Dominique Swain's performance was terrible. It was like watching a middle school play. The reaction when Darcy said she was raped and Matt commits suicide was just completely wrong. Not only that, but the soundtrack was awful. It sounded like really watered down grunge. The only good song was one that Cybil sings. Surprisingly, I thought that Tara Reid as Cybil was really interesting. However, because of the script, not even an Oscar worthy performance could save this movie. In conclusion, this movie is garbage, but it was a lot of fun for my sister and I to make fun of.

the outcome of happiness in this movie really didn't do it for me. The film tried to be a teen movie that deals with issues that a teenager will face in high school. But, the reality, is that this movie says: you're friend might commit suicide, or have massive sexual escapades, but in the end it will all be alright, which is not true. Not only did bad acting bad, but the story lacked in substance as well. I mean, it had potential. If they would had focused on a little more on her relationship with her parents on the subject of her virginity, I would spare the film, but they don't. I might be too realistic, but, no good father (which is what the film set up) would allow his daughter to just go out every night to sleep with some guy she has a crush on, and the fact that he did nothing when he knew was a major point of stupidity on the film-maker's part. But as I said before, the fact that everyone in the movie "needed" the main character so much killed me. Her drugy lesbian friend, Tara Reid (still half true), really made me mad for some reason, oh, now I remember it was that little make out session. Wow. How utterly stupid.

The story had a lot of potential, however, director Kahn's scatter-brained approach leaves the audience not knowing how to react. Is it a black comedy? No, because it isn't particularly ironic, dark, or clever. Is it a coming-of-age story? No, because the experiences of Andrea Marr are so unrealistic and therefore unrelatable to the average 18-year-old high-school girl.Let's start off with the fact that some big-shot rock star (Sean Patrick Flanery) falls in love with prudish nerd Andrea (Dominique Swain). Hunh? Their "love affair" is the focal point of the movie, but because the characters are so poorly developed we don't know why they're supposedly in love in the first place. One minute Andrea's a straight-A student headed for Brown University, the next she's hanging out with "street people" and has rock stars falling in love with her? There's absolutely no exposition. It just "happens" and the audience is supposed to buy it.Anyone who's actually gone to a real American high school knows that nerds do not hang out with the punks, goths or art kids. Yet Andrea manages to infiltrate the "cool" scene and is admired within it. Give me a break.This is probably one of Swain's worst performances. She is twitchy and has no chemistry with Flanery. Her facial expressions are all wrong in many scenes (the crying scene with her dad comes to mind). The most outstanding performance is, believe it or not, from Tara Reid. Her character had some emotional depth and you wanted to find more about her, her background, family, etc. Andrea, meanwhile, is just... a groupie. You don't feel empathy OR sympathy for her. You just wish she'd go away and find a decent hairstyle. Flanery comes off as a block of wood, as usual.Worst of all, the music sucked. Todd Sparrow's scenes onstage were overindulgent, and expectedly so since apparently the music is by the director himself. He sounds a lot like the singer from Creed, so consider yourself warned.I'm sorry to say there is very little redeeming quality to this movie. The script was awful, as was the direction and principal acting.