Login
"Waiting for you is like waiting for rain in this drought, useless and disappointing."
A chick flick with Hilary Duff? Did anyone expect this to end up being a good movie? A Cinderella Story is merely the classic tale of Cinderella that has been updated for the modern audience. Great, they do it with Shakespeare and now they're updating fairy-tales for the modern agenda? I really don't see the need.
A Cinderella Story is about a young girl named Sam Montgomery (Duff) who was orphaned as a child and is left to the mercy of her routinely oafish step-mother Fiona (Coolidge). Sam also lives with her hideous step sisters, and is basically treated like a slave by everyone in the house.
But Sam meets the man of her dreams in a chat room. For months they have exchanged pleasant messages from each other via internet chat rooms of mobile phone text messages. (Does anyone else think that if they had each other's mobile phone number they could just ring and chat voice-to-voice, and hence be done with the mystery?) The two then decide they should meet at the school Halloween dance. As it turns out, Sam's dream guy is the most popular bloke in school; Austin Ames (Murray).
From there on in it's a trip into familiar territory; no matter what happens we know how it is going to end. It's obvious how the film will end just by watching the first 10 minutes. But I found myself exhibiting an incredibly bleak, shallow tale that keeps going on and on with no ending in sight. But what is most frustrating is when Sam has ample opportunity to tell Austin face-to-face that she is his internet girl but always blows her chance. And at the Halloween ball...one simple little mask wouldn't be enough to cover her identity.
The whole movie is cheesy and predictable. And unlike most comedies like this, it ain't a fun ride to take. Hilary Duff is in dire need of acting lessons. With her character hoping to get into a certain university for the movie, I had a faint glimmer of hope that it would be some kind of acting school.
Chad Michael Murray isn't any better. He's robotic, wooden and always has the same expression on his face. And every time he tries to do something different he overdoes it. Jennifer Coolidge was the only one who actually supplied a few laughs because of how evil she is. Regina Hall and Dan Byrd were the stand-outs here though. Regina was really funny at times, and Dan actually tried to act. Qualities we never see in any of the main cast.
A Cinderella Story is very dull, corny and painfully predictable beyond all belief. It's nothing more than a retelling of the classic fairy-tale in a contemporary setting. Doing this with Shakespeare is a good idea to help the modern audience understand it more clearly, but this fairy-tale was already understandable. And hence the whole film is a complete and utter waste of time.
4/10
