I'm a Yorkshire lass, born & bred and proud of it. I wouldn't want to live anywhere else! I am marri...
I'm a Yorkshire lass, born & bred and proud of it. I wouldn't want to live anywhere else! I am married to my lovely hubby Lee and my terrible twosome are now 6 and 3, they don't half grow quickly.
Member since:21.10.2002
Reviews:34
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I like a lot of different genre of movies; we spend a fortune on DVD’s and going to the cinema. This one was one I had to drag my husband to see for a change (I was dragged to see the awful chronicles of Riddick!) The modern day story of Cinderella stars Hilary Duff asan High school senior called Samantha Montgomery. She lives at the beck and call of her self-obsessed stepmother Fiona (Jennifer Coolidge) and her sinful wicked stepsisters, who treat her more like a slave than a member of the family. With her sights set on attending Princeton, Sam finds her non-existant social life complicated when she meets her Prince Charming online. But when her anonymous cyber soul mate turns out to be her high school's über-popular quarterback Austin Ames (Chad Michael Murray), Sam makes a mad dash back to reality, leaving her mobile phone behind just before the clock strikes midnight in true Cinderella story fashion. Fearing rejection if her secret is revealed, Sam dodges Austin's efforts to discover the identity of his princess Cinderella in this comedy, romantic story. Will Sam let fear hold her back, or will she find the courage to be herself and have the life she's always dreamt of? Her chance at "happily ever after" in A Cinderella Story depends on it.
This timeless tale has been truly modernized. The royal ball turned into a Halloween homecoming dance, the evil stepmother turned into Stifler’s Mom (Jennifer Coolidge), the stepsisters became valley girls, and the glass slipper switched into a mobile phone.
Cinderella is Sam, aka PrincetonGirl818, a girl who spends her days studying to get into Princeton (because that’s where princesses go in this story), her nights slaving for her evil stepmother at a Valley roller diner. The majority of her school hours are spent text messaging her secret admirer, Austin (Chad Michael Murray), aka Nomad. The evil stepsisters are jokes with the combined IQ of an blank of wood, and the fairy godmother is a waitress with an attitude (Regina King).
Of course Prince Charming is the King of high school – he’s captain of the football team, student body president, and object of lust of every female freshman and above. As in all teen angst movies, Prince Charming really only wants to be a writer and ditch daddy’s dream for him (in this case it’s going to Princeton instead of USC). Cinderella is, of course, a social nobody that everyone calls “Diner Girl.” in this story. Her only friend is a method actor who goes into school as a different stereotype each day.
Amazingly, A Cinderella Story is actually quite good. Even though each character is a complete plank, everybody plays their part with enough panache to make it funny. Jennifer Coolidge highlights the movie as a perfect demonstration of what happens when white trash attacks. First-time writer Leigh Dunlap does a deft job of making valley girls even a little bit funny again, although there’s not an original bone in the movie’s body.
A Cinderella Story is not Oscar material but its not a Madonna movie either. It’s got enough humour to get a smirk about every five or ten minutes, but also has enough cheesiness and stupidity to raise plenty of laughs! A Cinderella Story ends up being nicely timed: it’s a decent romantic comedy. It’s also got typecast “hot teen guy ” Chad Michael Murray, which will ensure that the teen girl half of the cinema will be glued to their seats with drool. It has an edge on your run of the mill teen schlop and it should do well. It is almost guaranteed to end up in the DVD collection of plenty of teenage wanna bes if nothing else. Overall? Not half bad.
Amanda
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Comedy - Director: Richard Boden, Mandie Fletcher, Martin Shardlow - Original Language: English - Classification: 15 years and over - Starring: Hugh Laurie, Miranda Richardson, Stephen Fry, Brian Blessed, Tim McInnerny, Tony Robinson, Rowan Atkinson
Comedy - Original Language: English - Classification: 12 years and over - Starring: Tessa Peake-Jones, Buster Merryfield, David Jason, Nicholas Lyndhurst
Sounds like a film I would enjoy. Not a huge Hillary Duff fan but, hey, its got Jennifer Coolidge for comedic value and Chad Michael Murray for cute boy value. It seems like a win-win situation! Great review! Paula x
NIGSY 25.09.2004 10:06
For a chick flick its ok , but how could you say that Riddick is awful, great review, Neil.
clownfoot 14.09.2004 12:41
Good review - sounds sickening though, think I'll give this piece of chick-flick fluff a miss! Alboy
Cinderella never had it this bad. A twisted and hilarious update of the classic fairy tale ... more
- high school senior Sam (Hilary Duff) lives at the beck and call of her self-obsessed step-mother Fiona (Jennifer Coolidge) and her sinfully wicked step-sisters...
Advantages: Chad Michael Murray's looks Disadvantages: Predictable, boring, Hilary Duff acting like herself yet again, poor comedy, really unoriginal, idea just wasn’t executed well, lacklustre script, bad direction, terrible soundtrack mainly because Duff sings the majority of the songs.
BabyGirl 17.11.2004 (17.11.2004)
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Review of A Cinderella Story (DVD)
![A Cinderella Story [DVD] [2004]](http://picnica.ciao.com/uk/78512120.jpg "A Cinderella Story [DVD] [2004]")
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