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Neon Tommy - Annenberg digital news

"Easy A" Is More B Plus

Atiyyah Khan |
September 17, 2010 | 4:18 p.m. PDT

Staff Reporter

Emma Stone in "Easy A" (Photo courtesy of Sony Pictures)
Emma Stone in "Easy A" (Photo courtesy of Sony Pictures)
"Easy A"

(USA, 2010, 92min)

As far as teen-comedies go, "Easy A" goes down like a chewable treat, but then again, the genre is hardly receiving any stiff competition at the moment.

Emma Stone is the driving force behind what makes this film great and a script aiming high for wit (something teen-comedies are devoid of recently).

Stone is Olive Penderghast, a plain-jane who accidentally creates a rumor about her sexual misadventures and losing her virginity, to her detriment. Soon her entire high school accuses her of being a harlot, though she is propelled into popularity. But not the good kind of popular. Olive finds herself extending the lie, and manages to become the outsider at school. Added to the mix are the Christians who hate her, and the boy who she has a long-time crush, played by Penn Badgley of the TV show "Gossip Girl."

Constant references from 80's John Hughes teenage escapades enter the script, and the film takes on similarities of high-school evil from "Saved" and "Mean Girls." Social networking to convey gossip is also used extensively in "Easy A."

However something that the writers probably missed somehow,  is that most teenagers today are having sex, and that losing your virginity isn't quite the scandal it used to be.

The film is modeled loosely on Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter" to some extent, but unlike the way "Clueless" epically captures Emma, "Easy A" is too obvious about its references.

The other telling factor is that the film struggles in deciding who its audience is; often sitting on the edge between an R-rated audience and other times sticking purely to being a PG-13 rating. However, Stone's performance will secure this as a hit.

Verdict: The combined performance of Emma Stone and some cleverly written lines makes this teen-comedy better than most.

Rating: 3/5

To reach Atiyyah Khan click here.

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