Tried adaptation to snow white Sydney White set at college with the prince (Matt Long) being a fraternity head, the villain (Sara Paxton) being the evil fraternity head full of privilege and blond (you get the image it is going for), Amanda Bynes plays the construction girl Sydney. We gave it about 15 minutes and one sees flashes, one great joke with Bynes, some fun with the evil lady but jokes seem forced and dialogue stilted. Tried Georgian film My Happy Family, seems well constructed and performed but wasn't quite my thing.
Watched high-school comedy Charlie Bartlett. Premise: Charlie Bartlett (the late Anton Yelchin) is expelled again from private school, this time for forging driving licenses. His rich mother (Hope Davies) decides to send him to the local school where Bartlett seeks popularity and spots Susan (Kat Dennings), daughter of principle Nathan Gardner (Robert Downey Jr.).
This is a film that can be quite enjoyable one moment then flop the next. What worked was the initial relationship between Charlie and his caring if incompetent mother, Charlie's dreams of popularity leading to his clever and good natured schemes to get that. Charlie has charm and good manners to go with his brain to make a likeable lead, there is a bit of humour in what he tries, none of his schemes seek to shaft others and he treats people well. Some figures are one scene only but make an impact but there are others who become figures in his life like bully Murphy Bivens (Tyler Hilton). However even this stronger part of the film, there is a feeling of "if only better writing, could be even better" (Gustin Nash is the writer here), film trying to be a bit too quirky, going for big emotional scenes that have not had the build up required and, most annoyingly, support characters getting dropped completely. We really wish they had replaced some scenes with a strand they just completely dropped
Then there is the... less good strand. It isn't awful but it lacks spark, the romance lacks chemistry and neither the head teacher or the daughter are particularly engaging. When you see Charlie charm and help someone then swap to the romance or the headteacher's struggles, you can feel the enjoyment dip. Unfortunately guess which of the two strands makes up the end phase? Rather then ending with ommph, every worst aspect of the film comes into play and it drags.
Me: 6.0, Sis: 5.5