phoenixprimus

I'm a big Britney fan and I'm very proud of her music. As far as her acting, I wasn't to sure if she was going to do as well. She did a great job during her first stint on SNL but her last one wasn't as great. (I'm guessing its because the great cast members were gone by then, i.e. Wil Farrell) Usually when you're great at one thing, you're only okay at anything else. Kobe Bryant is arguably the best Basketball Player today but he can't rap a lick. But being that I'm a big fan, I threw away all doubts and I put my $8 to support her and I was pleasantly surprised. I was expecting 3 best friends to go on a road trip to become famous, *sigh*, not a very interesting story at all. But the fact that they were not best friends when the trip started and that they all were on the trip for very different reasons was a great change. The audition was not even Lucy's reason for the trip. It was only to see her mom. The chemistry between all the characters was impeccably real. The situations and issues that were dealt with are all real and some even hit home with me. Namely the situation between Lucy and her mom. Overall, I was very impressed. Brit, Zoë, Taryn and Anson did a great job of bringing real loveable characters to life. My hat's off to you all. And Britney . . . What can I say? When you're good, you're good.

Positives - My brother is in this movie. He's the Filipino guy with the white shirt and cream vest, listening intently to the conspiracy theory of Ben's cousin out with the tricked out cars. Side note: He also owns the Black CRX with the Red "Rush Factor" sticker on the windshield. The other nice things is that they did an excellent job of capturing the "you know you're Filipino when . . ." attributes. The film is quite funny and quite accurate.

Negative - While I let this slide because its the first fil-am movie, I'd like to see less ethno-centric films. Films where nationality isn't the focal point. I have the same complaint about most African-american films. Like say they made "The Fast And the Furious" but all the main characters are Filipino. The story itself could happen to anyone, it just so happened to happen to a Filipino. The other part is that it is too general, but again, since its the first, I suppose it was necessary.

Overall - an 8. For all its flaws, they were necessary for this film because one of the main objectives was to show what the filipino culture was, both the good, the bad and the typical. And my brother was in it. hah

This movie was a great movie. Kirsten Dunst and Eliza Dushku were very believable unique characters. The premise of the movie was fabulously original. My only qualm with this movie was the way it ended, although I will agree that in life the true winner can get cheated out of it simply because the challenger has a sob story. Great fun, it was nice to see some of the supporting cast get breaks on TV: Bianca Kajlich (Carver, the broken leg girl that gave Eliza the chance to join) is/was a regular on Boston Public. Courtney (Clare Kramer) is/was Glory on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It is a must see for fans of the youth movement.