598. She’s The Man (2006)

Starring: Amanda Bynes, Channing Tatum, Laura Ramsey

Director: Andy Fickman

Running Time: 105 mins

She’s The Man is an American film about a girl, Viola, who pretends to be her brother, Sebastian, while he’s in London so that she can get on the boys’ football team, because the one at her school got cancelled, however when she’s at the boys’ school, she falls in love with her room mate, Duke, who’s actually in love with another girl, Olivia, who’s in love with Sebastian, who’s really Viola.

Yeah. I think that summary explains pretty well how idiotic this film is. It’s got a very weak storyline, with millions of plot holes, while the comedy is largely very unfunny, the performances are bad, and it’s not very interesting to watch, and yet it’s somehow bearably entertaining.

One thing about this film that is a positive is how it slightly detracts from the girly high school Mean Girls sort of thing. Not very much, but the story about the girl pretending to be a boy adds a separate level from the social story, which is a nice break, however it does regularly fall into the trap of these generic films.

And although I’m not a big advocate of the concept, this does fit in quite well as a so-bad-it’s-good film. It’s cheesy, it’s not funny, and it’s annoying, but it’s so much like that that you find yourself laughing at it rather than with it, but that’s still an entertaining experience.

Anyway, now back to reality. From the start, this really isn’t funny. The main concept is original for about 5 seconds, but it soon falls down and becomes as dull and unfunny as the rest of this film, which seems to be at points quite family-oriented, due to the lack of swearing for this genre, and yet the plot is very teen-directed.

And that makes this film almost impossible for anyone to really laugh at. If you’re 6, you might find it funny, but you won’t get the plot, and it may be a little inappropriate, while if you’re 26, you definitely won’t find it funny, and even though you’ll get the story, you’ll still find it incredibly annoying.

Finally, I’d like to give a shout-out to Channing Tatum and Amanda Bynes for some very poor performances. Tatum is playing an irritating jock, more so than his usual roles nowadays, while Bynes is constantly frustrating to see on screen, and is so constantly poor that it really adds to the level of annoyance of this film.

Overall, this gets a 5.8, because although it’s somehow slightly enjoyable, it’s a constantly irritating and unfunny film that won’t really appeal to anyone.