Easy A

EASY A
SONY
RELEASED 22 October 2010
‘Easy A’ contains the breakout comedy performance of the year. Emma Stone narrates the movie, she’s in virtually every scene, and Stone simply ‘is’ the movie. It’s open to debate whether the film would work as well if another actress had taken the part. Make no mistake, Emma Stone has arrived (and should become ‘A-list’ in 2012 with the female lead in the rebooted ‘Spider-Man’).
Olive (Emma Stone) is a smart but insignicant member of Ojai High School.?Desperate for best friend Rhiannon (Aly Michalka) to stop questioning her about her uneventful weekend, she makes up a lurid story about losing her virginity. Overheard by the school gossip, Olive decides not to pour water on the wildfire news, and she decides to play up to her new slutty image just for fun, even faking more sexual encounters. Unsurprisingly, things eventually gets out of hand…
Although ‘Easy A’ is Emma Stone’s calling card, there is an equally important element that makes it such a success, and that’s the script by Bert V. Royal. It has a pace and vitality that few teen movies can muster, and there are so many quoteable lines that young girls will get plenty of repeat value from the DVD. How about, ‘This is public school. If I can keep the girls off the pole and the boys off the pipe, I get a bonus.’ Or, ‘What is with you gays? Are you really that repulsed by lady parts? What do you think I have down there? A gnome?’
The movie actually pays respect to John Hughes 80’s classics (‘Ferris Bueller’, ‘Sixteen Candles’, ‘Breakfast Club’) over a little video clip segement, with the lines,
‘Whatever happened to chivalry? Does it only exist in 80′s movies? I want John Cusack holding a boombox outside my window. I want Jake from Sixteen Candles waiting outside the church for me. I want Judd Nelson thrusting his fist into the air because he knows he got me. Just once I want my life to be like an 80′s movie, preferably one with a really awesome musical number for no apparent reason. But no, no, John Hughes did not direct my life.’
And yes, Olive does get her own musical number. I wouldn’t hesitate to say ‘Easy A’ is as funny as post-Hughes high school classics like ‘Heathers’, ‘Clueless’, and ‘Mean Girls’.
The movie slightly loses it’s momentum (and way) in the last third, and it’s a bit difficult to feel sorry for Olive when her plight is so daft and self-inflicted. But minor quibbles aside, ‘Easy A’ is, ahem, ‘easily’ one of the best films of 2010.
FOUR OUT OF FIVE