#CINDERELLA STARSTRUCK MOVIE#
#CINDERELLA STARSTRUCK PLUS#

#CINDERELLA STARSTRUCK MOVIE#

I’m excited to have the opportunity to extend my experiences now to film and review for IRISH FILM CRITIC.A decade after Bailee Madison stole scenes from her Just Go With It co-stars Jennifer Aniston and Adam Sandler, the Wizards of Waverly Placealum is singing her way into the spotlight with the highly-anticipated film, A Cinderella Story: Starstruck. This is the sixth movie in the Cinderella Story franchise first made famous by Hillary Duff's 2004 runaway Disney hit. I am currently serving as an Associate Critic for John Garcia’s THE COLUMN, an online theatre magazine and I see and review local community theatre shows for that outlet. I live in Garland and after being retired for 18 years, I have gone back to work in an elementary school library. Although my training is in theatre and I have acted and directed in Repertory Theatre, college and community theatre, I am always drawn back to the films. In college in the ’60s, the Granada in Dallas became our “go-to” art theater where we soaked up 8 ½, THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY, WILD STRAWBERRIES and every other Bergman film to play there.

Later, in a theatre with my mom and aunt watching WUTHERING HEIGHTS, I found myself sobbing along with the two of them as Katherine and Heathcliff were separated forever. I was so young in my first film experiences, I would stare at that BIG screen and wonder “what were those people up there saying?” And then as a slightly older girl watching Margaret O’Brien in THE RED SHOES, I dreamed of being a ballerina. I can remember being a girl fascinated by the original CINDERELLA and trying to understand that the characters weren’t REAL? But how was that possible? Because my mom was a cinema lover, she often took me with her instead of leaving me with a babysitter. The film’s overall theme (“be true to yourself”) is certainly an appropriate one to aim at that audience as are the secondary themes of “be kind and appreciate what you have,” and “value happiness over wealth and fame.” Who is going to argue those points? Throw in some pretty impressive rope tricks and you’ve got yourself a winner! Oh, and did I mention the pig? But hey, it’s a film aimed primarily at the eight to thirteen-year-old age group and as we all know, their imagination is very fluid. A couple of awkward scenes are apparently thrown in for some gratuitous “gay” jokes, but overall, the film is going to require a considerable stretch of your imagination to accept all that it throws at you. Jack Harmon is mean and sharp as a knife-edge as Kale, our heroine’s evil stepbrother. Madison is cute as a button as Finley, though her costumes overall are a bit seductive for a down-home country girl. Add in some drama, disguises that threaten to go wrong, and the requisite evil stepmother and step-siblings and there’s your plot. Well, that is our “Cinderella” (Finley Tremaine) and our “Prince” (Jackson Stone) are charming and wholesome and Bailee Madison and Michael Evans Behling are perfect in those roles. The music is peppy, the dancing is rousing, the characters are charming and wholesome as apple pie. However, since this is the latest in the string of “Cinderella” stories put to film, there must be mixups, small disasters, close calls, and the required happy ending.

#CINDERELLA STARSTRUCK PLUS#

The storyline is predictable: cute, exuberant girl plus sweet, handsome guy equals instant fireworks of the heart. When a Hollywood film crew arrives in her sleepy town, she is determined to land a role in the production and capture the attention of handsome lead actor Jackson Stone. Finley Tremaine, a small-town farm girl, longs to spread her wings and soar as an aspiring performer.

Cinderella starstruck