Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen (2004) Lindsay Lohan, Adam Garcia, Glenne Headly, Alison Pill, Eli Marienthal, Carol Kane, Megan Fox, Sheila McCarthy Movie Review

Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen (2004)   3/53/53/53/53/5


Lindsay Lohan in Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen (2004)

Lohan has a Drama

When Mary (Lindsay Lohan - The Parent Trap) is forced to leave New York and move to Dellwood, New Jersey with her mother and sisters she thinks her life is over. And things don't get much better when she shows up at her new high school and finds resident queen B, Carla (Megan Fox - Jennifer's Body), ready to make her life a misery. The only thing that Mary, who prefers to be known as Lola, has going is her love forStu (Adam Garcia - Riding in Cars with Boys), the lead singer of SidArthur, a love she shares with her new friend Ella (Alison Pill). So when SidArthur announce the end of the band and a farewell gig Lola persuades Ella that they must go to New York and see their beloved band before they call it a day.

Now to be frank forget that the movie is called "Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen" it's a terrible title for a movie which does it little justice. And it does it little justice because what we have is a storyline built on cliches starting with Mary who wants to be known as Lola having to start at a new school in the suburbs having left New York with her mother. What follows is the mean clique lead by Carla who ridicules Lola for being different plus we have the handsome young man who takes a shine to Lola, two very unoriginal stories. Add the fact that Lola lies to try and make herself more interesting and we have another cliche thrown in.

Lindsay Lohan and Megan Fox in Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen (2004)

But then we get the second story which sees Lola and her new friend Ella going to New York to see the farewell gig of their favourite band SidArthur where Lola discovers that rock god Stu is not all she hoped he would be. What follows on from there, and I won't go into detail, is pretty much as obvious as the rest of the movie before delivering a happy ever after ending. As I said this movie offers nothing for adults but just enough for teen girls who will enjoy all the bubble gum nicety which also includes a shallow, colourful update of Pygmalion.

But here is the thing whilst I can appreciate that this probably works for young teen girls, who will enjoy all the simple fantasy, there are times I question the film makers decisions. Maybe it's me but seeing Lindsay Lohan in tight t-shirts which show her figure seems to be delivering a strange sort of message and then seeing her in the shortest of dresses where she has to place her hand to maintain her decency when she sits down definitely seems to be delivering the wrong message. It just seems to me a little wrong for a movie which is aimed at such a young audience to have characters which promote this sort of revealing fashion, if the target audience was older it wouldn't be so bad but this feels slightly wrong.

As for Lindsay Lohan well to be honest this is a movie which relies on her to carry it and unfortunately she doesn't achieve it, needing stronger support to help her out. That doesn't mean the support is bad, Megan Fox as Carla does a decent job of playing it spiteful and Alison Pill as plain Jane Ella reminded me of Mare Winningham in "St. Elmo's Fire" delivering a cliche but nice take on the ordinary girl character. But because every scene relies on Lohan to be bubbly, or sulky it just seems too much pressure for the young actress who had already proven she had talent when given the right role.

What this all boils to is that "Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen" is aimed at a young teen audience of girls and I hope that the target audience will enjoy it. But for anyone else it offers absolutely nothing and is little more that one cliche after another.


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