Easy A

PLOT (spoiler alert!!!):

Olive Penderghast lies to her best friend Rhiannon about going on a date in order to get out of camping with her and her hippie parents. Instead, she hangs around the house all weekend, listening to “Pocketful of Sunshine”. The following Monday, pressed by Rhiannon, Olive lies about losing her virginity to a college guy. Marianne, a girl at their school who is a zealous Christian, overhears her telling the lie and soon it spreads like wildfire.

The school has a conservative church group run by Marianne who decides Olive will be their next project. The group’s harassment, disguised as concern, comes to head at an English class taught by Mr. Griffith. The class is reading The Scarlet Letter, a novel about adultery and shame. When one of the girls from the church group makes a snide comment to Olive suggesting Olive wear a red A as well, Olive shoots back and Mr. Griffith sends her to the principal’s office. During her detention she tells her friend Brandon the truth, and he explains how others bully him because he’s gay.

Brandon comes over later and asks Olive to pretend to sleep with him so that he will be accepted by everyone else at school. Brandon convinces Olive and they pretend to have sex at a party. Afterwards she bumps into Todd, whom she almost kissed years ago during seven minutes in heaven but instead agreed to lie about it when he said he was not ready.

After having a fight with Rhiannon over her (Olive’s) new identity as a “dirty skank”, Olive decides to counteract the harassment by embracing her new image as the school tramp. She begins to wear more provocative clothing and stitches a red ‘A’ (a la Hester Prynne in The Scarlet Letter) to everything she wears. Boys who usually have had no luck with girls in the past begin to give her gift cards and money to say they have had sex with her in order to increase their own popularity, which in turn increases her reputation.

Olive comes to short-lived understanding with Marianne, but it is ruined when Marianne’s boyfriend Micah gets chlamydia and lies that Olive gave it to him. Olive sees Mrs. Griffith, the guidance counselor and her teacher’s wife, who tearfully confesses that she slept with Micah. Olive promises to take the blame to save Mrs. Griffith’s job and marriage. Rhiannon, partly jealous of the attention Olive is getting, joins the church group and starts harassing her former best friend.

Olive soon realizes that, though everyone thinks she is sleeping around, no one was actually attempting to sleep with her. This changes when Anson comes up to her and asks her out. The date goes sour when Olive sees Rhiannon at the restaurant and remembers she has a crush on Anson. In the parking lot, Anson attempts to pay her off; Olive asks what they will say happened but Anson thinks he will actually get sex and tries to kiss her. She resists and he drives off. Todd, who works at the restaurant, sees her and offers to drive her home.

Todd tells her that he does not believe the rumor mill, he remembers when she lied for him because he wasn’t ready for his first kiss and thinks she is actually great. He says he wishes she actually was his first kiss, and not Rhi. Todd then asks for permission to kiss Olive but she says no, wanting to wait until she sorts out her life.

Olive goes to the boys that propositioned her and demands they admit that the rumors are all lies but they refuse (and Brandon even ran off, leaving behind a note telling his parents he’s gay). When she goes to Mrs. Griffith to make her come clean, she refuses and implies that no one would believe Olive over her. Olive runs to Mr. Griffith and tells him the truth but immediately regrets it, realizing she just destroyed a marriage.

To get everything finally in the open, she does a song and dance number at a pep rally and pretends she will be doing a sex show via web cam with Todd. In actuality she confesses what she has done. She also makes up with Rhi, apologizing for lying. When she is finishing up, Todd comes by riding a lawnmower, holding a boombox and tells her to come out. She closes her web cam confession saying she really likes Todd and maybe she will lose her virginity to him in the future but at the end of the day it is no one’s business but her own. She leaves the house to kiss him and they ride off from the neighborhood on the lawnmower.

REVIEW:

 This is one of those films that people were raving about last year. I wanted to see it when it came out, but low fundage and scheduling pu a hindrance to that plan.

I was able to watch it afternoon and I have to say that you can believe the hype with this. The best way I can think to describe this is to combine the tone of any John Hughes film with the basic theme of The Scarlet Letter and throw them into today’s high school society.

If you think I’m just trying to make a bad comparisons, I assure you I’m not. As a matter of fact, the main character even mentions (and shows clips) from many John Hughes films, as well as clips from the Demi Moore version of The Scarlet Letter, as well as the old black and white version. Of corse, she is quick to point out that the black and white version is better(who would want to see Demi Moore bathing?), but you should still read the book.

So, what is the actual plot of this film? Well, Olive, is one of those unknown girls a this high school. After a weekend of avoiding a camping trip with her best friend because she made up a blind date with some guy, she lies to her again and says she has sex with him, thus giving her the reputation of being a slut (don’t you just love high school?).

This leads to an agreement with a gay friend to tell the school he got lucky to keep him from being bullied, which ends up fueling the rest of the film as guys come out of the woodwork for her to the same for them, making her an even bigger slut, until she can’t take it anymore.

I actually liked the way this film told and moved the story along at a steady enough pace without getting all preachy, dramatic, or boring. The comedy that is present during each of these scenes is what really drives it home.

Mix that with the suspension of disbelief. Seriously, are you going to tell me that no high school boy would ask out the seriously hot, yet attainable, Emma Stone?!? I find that hard to swallow.

On that same token, I find it hard to believe that the mascot (token single hot guy) was single, as well. Then again, he was the mascot.

I wish I’d had parents like these. Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t have uber-strict parents, but who wouldn’t want a set of parental units that all but look the other way and go along with whatever you ask them to?

This film does have a little bit of a negative, though. The lagging middle section that almost all films have.  In this case, it really seems to almost bring the film to a grinding halt, because it is such a departure from the way the film was going. It is like the C section of a poem that goes ABABABCAB, for example. It is just random.

This cast is truly remarkable. Emma Stone owns this film, much the same way she commands your attention in everything she’s in. It must be the red hair and the husky voice.

Amanda Bynes is cute and funny in this, just as she always is. I found it funny that this character would work perfect as the daughter of her mother from Hairspray. Not bad for someone who was retired, huh?

For once Stanley Tucci is not playing a gay man, though he does mention he’s experimented. He and Patricia Clarkson are great in their small roles as Olive’s parents.

Thomas Haden Church and Lisa Kudrow are great in their roles. Much like the parents, I wish we cold have gotten a bit more, but there is sch a thing as too much of agood thing, right?

Penn Badgely, as I mentioned before, is nothing more than the token hot guy. He isn’t really that great of an actor, but in a role like this where all he has to do is swoop in and save the day, it seems to work for him.

Aly Michalka, of Aly & AJ fame, surprised me. I didn’t know she could actually act (if you can call it that). She does what she has to, though, which is appear to be the hot best friend. Although, the only thing she has on Emma Stone is a bigger bra size (implants, methinks).

How often does a film come along that both audiences and critics agree on? Easy A is one of those films. If you don’t know who Emma Stone is, you will by the end of this flick, trust me. The one thing that sticks out the most to me about this flick is how it appears to have been made by someone who was a fan of those John Hughes films of the 80s and wanted to make one for today’s audiences. I think they did a good job of doing so, but you’ll have to find out for yourself.

5 out of 5 stars