Recently, a high school in my area launched a production of High School Musical
based on the popular made-for-TV Disney movie. Mom and I had both heard
of the film before, but reading the article about the play was enough
to compel us to check out the movie. After two video stores failed to
have it in stock, we found success with my 9- and 11-year-old cousins,
who own the movie and were happy to lend it. I appreciate their
generosity. But maybe the universe was trying to tell us something when
we came home from the video stores empty handed.
From the moment High School Musical begins, it feels
like it was made for television. Somehow I thought this one might be a
cut above the average, but in fact it smacks of all the corniness
inherent in most Tween-centered Disney shows these days. We meet our two
young stars at a New Year's Eve party at a lodge, where both are on
vacation with their families. Troy Bolton (Zac Efron) is a talented
basketball player, as he pretty much has to be since his dad (Bart
Johnson) is not only a former champion but his coach. Bookish Gabriella
Montez (Vanessa Anne Hudgens) is used to sitting on the sidelines,
except when she's taking part in academic competitions. But when the DJ
in charge of karaoke at the party forces the two onstage for an
impromptu performance, they both discover untapped talent... and each
other. It's the last day of vacation, so they don't expect to see each
other again any time soon, but then of all the high schools in all the
cities in all the country, Gabriella has to walk into his.
Conveniently, her family has just moved into Troy's town, so massive
coincidence places her and Troy in close proximity to one another once
again, this time for keeps. And with their newfound singing abilities,
not to mention a desire to spend as much time together as possible, the
lovebirds defy convention and audition for the "winter musicale," which
will be under the direction of loopy acting teacher Ms Darbus (Alyson
Reed), dodging all sorts of obstacles along the way. Troy faces pressure
not only from his dad but from his whole team, particularly his best
friend Chad (Corbin Bleu), to "keep his head in the game"; after
scheming drama queen Sharpay Evans (Ashley Tisdale) circulates news of
the new girl's past intellectual victories, the brainiacs play into her
hand and nab Gabriella for the Scholastic Decathlon. Throw in their own
insecurities about trying something completely different, and they have a
lot working against them.
Kind of like this movie has a lot
working against it, but while Troy and Gabriella are fated to overcome
their obstacles to not only nab the lead roles in the play but become
schoolwide heroes in the process (come on, you knew that was coming), High School Musical
never quite rises above the schlock to become something greater. I
confess I'm baffled by the popularity this movie has enjoyed. While its
main characters are likable enough and the songs are reasonably catchy,
every single performance is laughably over-the-top, and the film relies
heavily upon the very stereotypes it seems to be trying to break.
None of the acting impressed me very much, as all of the cast members
seem to lean upon exaggerated expressions and whatever high school
cliches best fit them. Especially onerous are Tisdale, who smirks her
way through the movie with a hearty measure of rolled eyes, hair flips
and simpers thrown in, and Reed, who delivers amusement but takes her
character's eccentric pomposity to a scarcely tolerable level. Of
course, she is given some of the most ridiculous dialogue in the movie
to work with; while I've known people like Ms Darbus, it seems the
writers were striving to make her unbelievable, as when, on two
occasions, Troy and Gabriella show up two seconds after she has called
for the next auditioners and she protests heavily that the opportunity
has passed, or when she sternly tells a basketball-toting Chad that her
homeroom is not a hockey rink. Sharpay easily manipulates her into
rescheduling the call-backs so that they're the same time as the
basketball championship and the academic competition; what's the point
of having call-backs at all if the only challengers to the long-running
leads (Sharpay and her brother Ryan (Lucas Grabeel), which seems a bit
odd considering that most shows with a lead male and female role revolve
around a romantic relationship) are unavailable to try out? Perhaps the
point we're supposed to take from this is that Ms Darbus is stuck in a
rut just like her pupils and doesn't particularly want to risk messing
things up by casting newbies in her show, but the plot contrivances just
seem a little too frequent and glaring for my liking.
Just as
shaky as the writing and the acting are the musical sequences. Sure,
these kids have pretty decent voices, but each of the songs looks
unforgivably phony. There's nothing natural about the way they are
singing; Gabriella may be casually walking down the hall, and Troy may
be dribbling a basketball, but they both sound like they're in a
recording studio, and we never forget for a moment that the actors are
lip-synching. It's From Justin to Kelly
all over again, from the overblown choreography and cheesy lyrics to
the determination of conniving friends to nip an unlikely romance in the
bud. It's also Mean Girls,
as the students so rigidly divided into distinct cliques begin to come
together, discovering that you can be both an athlete and a baker, a
geek and a hip-hop enthusiast. That's a message worth imparting, but it
comes in such heavy-handed trappings that even a cornball like me can't
choke it down. I'm glad that millions of pre-teens have gotten such a
kick out of this little flick, but as for me, I've seen dozens of high
school musicals right here in my own hometown that have impressed me
more.
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