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Boys and Girls
List Price: Unknown [Buy now and save at Amazon]
The Movie:
I'm willing to accept that the teen comedy is not an art form. I'm willing to accept that most of them are 90 minutes of light-weight jokes. But, there are occasional films in this genre that don't even meet basic requirements. Director Robert Iscove came up with the first example in "She's All That", a badly acted and boring film. Before watching "Boys and Girls", the idea of watching another film by the director was not the way I wanted to spend two hours.
And, after watching the film, I find that I should listen to my feelings more. With few exceptions, "Boys and Girls" is more of the same, a very predictable, feather-weight comedy whose laughs succeed very infrequently. In fact, the only source of any humor in the film is a supporting performance from "American Pie"'s Jason Biggs, who has a genuine sense of comic timing. Biggs at least has something to offer, which is more than I can say for just about every actor in the film, but I suppose I'll talk about the plot first since that won't take very long.
The film stars Freddie Prinze, Jr. as Ryan and Claire Forlani as Jennifer, who first meet as kids and don't get along. Then they meet again, and again and still don't get along. As with any comedy, obviously, eventually they will find themselves getting along. By this time though, we won't find ourselves caring. The characters are lacking all but surface details, so why should we care about why they'll get together?
The performers also give us no reason to care. Forlani has shown that she can do decent work in other, more serious pictures, but in little films like this, she seems awkward at handling the comedy. Prinze does the same thing over and over in every single teen film he's been in, and he's even a more predictable actor here. Heather Donahue of "The Blair Witch Project" has a brief role as Prinze's girlfriend, and I was waiting for her to turn to the camera and go, "Oh, God...get me out of here! I'm so...sorry!"
The worst thing about "Boys and Girls" is there is a lot of chatter. In a teen film, that can often be unintentionally hilarious, and it's that way here, as the film takes its thoughts on romance way too seriously. Ok, so I didn't hate this film quite as much as I absolutely disliked "She's All That", but at the same time, there's really nothing here. It's 93 minutes of completely harmless, completely flat, completely uninteresting filmmaking with dull non-characters.
I understand "light entertainment", but I hope the audience demands more from films in the genre like this by not paying for tickets. There could be really great teen romantic comedies with actual characters and realistic dialogue, and hopefully, someone will provide this audience with that kind of picture. Until then, predictable is the keyword for the kind of entertainment that's probably going to be offered.
The DVD
VIDEO: I was pleased with Miramax's anamorphic transfer for "Boys and Girls", shown in the film's original aspect ratio of 1.85:1. The film was shot in San Fransisco, and many of the exterior scenes look excellent, with great scenery in the backgrounds of many shots. Sharpness and detail are consistently excellent, and even the film's dark or dimly lit scenes are well-defined and clear.
The only real problem that I saw occasionally in the image quality was a few instances where a light trace amount of pixelation was visible. Not a distracting problem, and the print used looked great, with only one or two very minor speckles visible throughout the whole film. Colors are great as well, with deep, rich colors that look warm and bright. Black level is solid and flesh tones are accurate and natural. Overall, not a stunning presentation, but a very good one.
SOUND: The film is presented in Dolby Digital 5.1 and the audio is not terribly lively. There are a few moments where music comes into the scene that are decently enveloping, but for the most part, this is a dialogue-heavy presentation where little or no surround use. Dialogue is clear and easily heard, unfortunately.
MENUS:: Menus are non-animated, with very basic images serving as backgrounds.
EXTRAS: Wow. It's going to be really easy to write this section of the review. Not even a trailer. Nothing. Zip. Zero. Not even a music video, or anything.
Final Thoughts: Skip it. Although the presentation is fine in terms of picture/audio quality, the film is nothing new or interesting, and for $32.99 we don't even get a trailer...
I'm willing to accept that the teen comedy is not an art form. I'm willing to accept that most of them are 90 minutes of light-weight jokes. But, there are occasional films in this genre that don't even meet basic requirements. Director Robert Iscove came up with the first example in "She's All That", a badly acted and boring film. Before watching "Boys and Girls", the idea of watching another film by the director was not the way I wanted to spend two hours.
And, after watching the film, I find that I should listen to my feelings more. With few exceptions, "Boys and Girls" is more of the same, a very predictable, feather-weight comedy whose laughs succeed very infrequently. In fact, the only source of any humor in the film is a supporting performance from "American Pie"'s Jason Biggs, who has a genuine sense of comic timing. Biggs at least has something to offer, which is more than I can say for just about every actor in the film, but I suppose I'll talk about the plot first since that won't take very long.
The film stars Freddie Prinze, Jr. as Ryan and Claire Forlani as Jennifer, who first meet as kids and don't get along. Then they meet again, and again and still don't get along. As with any comedy, obviously, eventually they will find themselves getting along. By this time though, we won't find ourselves caring. The characters are lacking all but surface details, so why should we care about why they'll get together?
The performers also give us no reason to care. Forlani has shown that she can do decent work in other, more serious pictures, but in little films like this, she seems awkward at handling the comedy. Prinze does the same thing over and over in every single teen film he's been in, and he's even a more predictable actor here. Heather Donahue of "The Blair Witch Project" has a brief role as Prinze's girlfriend, and I was waiting for her to turn to the camera and go, "Oh, God...get me out of here! I'm so...sorry!"
The worst thing about "Boys and Girls" is there is a lot of chatter. In a teen film, that can often be unintentionally hilarious, and it's that way here, as the film takes its thoughts on romance way too seriously. Ok, so I didn't hate this film quite as much as I absolutely disliked "She's All That", but at the same time, there's really nothing here. It's 93 minutes of completely harmless, completely flat, completely uninteresting filmmaking with dull non-characters.
I understand "light entertainment", but I hope the audience demands more from films in the genre like this by not paying for tickets. There could be really great teen romantic comedies with actual characters and realistic dialogue, and hopefully, someone will provide this audience with that kind of picture. Until then, predictable is the keyword for the kind of entertainment that's probably going to be offered.
The DVD
VIDEO: I was pleased with Miramax's anamorphic transfer for "Boys and Girls", shown in the film's original aspect ratio of 1.85:1. The film was shot in San Fransisco, and many of the exterior scenes look excellent, with great scenery in the backgrounds of many shots. Sharpness and detail are consistently excellent, and even the film's dark or dimly lit scenes are well-defined and clear.
The only real problem that I saw occasionally in the image quality was a few instances where a light trace amount of pixelation was visible. Not a distracting problem, and the print used looked great, with only one or two very minor speckles visible throughout the whole film. Colors are great as well, with deep, rich colors that look warm and bright. Black level is solid and flesh tones are accurate and natural. Overall, not a stunning presentation, but a very good one.
SOUND: The film is presented in Dolby Digital 5.1 and the audio is not terribly lively. There are a few moments where music comes into the scene that are decently enveloping, but for the most part, this is a dialogue-heavy presentation where little or no surround use. Dialogue is clear and easily heard, unfortunately.
MENUS:: Menus are non-animated, with very basic images serving as backgrounds.
EXTRAS: Wow. It's going to be really easy to write this section of the review. Not even a trailer. Nothing. Zip. Zero. Not even a music video, or anything.
Final Thoughts: Skip it. Although the presentation is fine in terms of picture/audio quality, the film is nothing new or interesting, and for $32.99 we don't even get a trailer...
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