Big Girls Just Wanna Have Fun
Two months after an ebullient Jennifer Garner emerged at the Academy Awards in a bold, red dress, evoking 1940s Hollywood glamour, her star turn has come with the release of 13 Going on 30. The bubbly nostalgia trip is a weak showcase for Miss Garner.
The story is a female spin on the 1988 Tom Hanks picture Big; flat-chested Jenna (played at 13 by Christa B. Allen) yearns to be a full-figured adult, and she gets her wish. Jenna becomes Jennifer Garner's tall drink of water. Jenna seems to have it all: a jock boyfriend, a top job and a closet filled with designer clothes and shoes. Her best friend, a good-natured nerd who actually dances at parties, grows into a schleppish Mark Ruffalo. Jenna's catty girlfriend sprouts into Jenna's colleague at a top women's magazine.
Once she acts out her juvenile innocence, 13-year-old Jenna realizes she has stepped into 30-year-old Jenna's morally questionable life. As she sprinkles love, goodness and contagious '80s optimism (courtesy of the Go-Go's and Pat Benatar), she falls for nerdy Ruffalo, faces her mistakes and prepares for a lipsticked showdown at the magazine.
Gary Winick has directed a tightly choreographed flick, which looks like a Cyndi Lauper slumber party. The movie's highlight is Jenna's dance to pre-Pepsi-burn-accident Michael Jackson's "Thriller," which she persuades a Manhattan disk jockey to play at a hip-hop party—as if DJs take requests. The party's host wonders why the gig's a dud, and Jenna bursts: "Well, maybe if they played something with a melody!" That's the cue for an exuberant dance number, and it's 13 Going on 30's best shot.
The choppy script moves with the grace of an '80s' hairstyle in a convertible. Jenna adapts too quickly, whipping out a cell phone like a stockbroker and sticking trendy chopsticks in her perfect hair with the expertise of a high-priced salon. Ruffalo's photographer is a catch-all mix of Punk Rock, Westchester and anything that improbably brings the focus back to Miss Garner. Kathy Baker as Jenna's warm mother captures the movie's most sincere moment, but soon it's back to the bubble gum plot.
Jenna is 13's biggest deficit: there isn't enough to know or like about teenage Jenna—who seeks the approval of others—and the adult Jenna never rejects secondhand self-esteem. One gets the sense that Miss Garner, who tries too hard, has been preened as a gawky, big-lipped Julia Roberts protégé. Like Miss Roberts, beauty is ultimately overshadowed by a lack of efficacy, almost as if being awkward is a woman's highest virtue. Watching her grows surprisingly tiresome.
13 Going on 30 is too childish to celebrate the childlike. But bubble gum has its flavor, and the inner child metaphor is an appealing premise—Big, both Freaky Fridays and The Kid—and, amid toothless lesbian serial killers and vapid blondes killing vapid killers, 13 Going on 30 offers a pleasant enough diversion.
The story is a female spin on the 1988 Tom Hanks picture Big; flat-chested Jenna (played at 13 by Christa B. Allen) yearns to be a full-figured adult, and she gets her wish. Jenna becomes Jennifer Garner's tall drink of water. Jenna seems to have it all: a jock boyfriend, a top job and a closet filled with designer clothes and shoes. Her best friend, a good-natured nerd who actually dances at parties, grows into a schleppish Mark Ruffalo. Jenna's catty girlfriend sprouts into Jenna's colleague at a top women's magazine.
Once she acts out her juvenile innocence, 13-year-old Jenna realizes she has stepped into 30-year-old Jenna's morally questionable life. As she sprinkles love, goodness and contagious '80s optimism (courtesy of the Go-Go's and Pat Benatar), she falls for nerdy Ruffalo, faces her mistakes and prepares for a lipsticked showdown at the magazine.
Gary Winick has directed a tightly choreographed flick, which looks like a Cyndi Lauper slumber party. The movie's highlight is Jenna's dance to pre-Pepsi-burn-accident Michael Jackson's "Thriller," which she persuades a Manhattan disk jockey to play at a hip-hop party—as if DJs take requests. The party's host wonders why the gig's a dud, and Jenna bursts: "Well, maybe if they played something with a melody!" That's the cue for an exuberant dance number, and it's 13 Going on 30's best shot.
The choppy script moves with the grace of an '80s' hairstyle in a convertible. Jenna adapts too quickly, whipping out a cell phone like a stockbroker and sticking trendy chopsticks in her perfect hair with the expertise of a high-priced salon. Ruffalo's photographer is a catch-all mix of Punk Rock, Westchester and anything that improbably brings the focus back to Miss Garner. Kathy Baker as Jenna's warm mother captures the movie's most sincere moment, but soon it's back to the bubble gum plot.
Jenna is 13's biggest deficit: there isn't enough to know or like about teenage Jenna—who seeks the approval of others—and the adult Jenna never rejects secondhand self-esteem. One gets the sense that Miss Garner, who tries too hard, has been preened as a gawky, big-lipped Julia Roberts protégé. Like Miss Roberts, beauty is ultimately overshadowed by a lack of efficacy, almost as if being awkward is a woman's highest virtue. Watching her grows surprisingly tiresome.
13 Going on 30 is too childish to celebrate the childlike. But bubble gum has its flavor, and the inner child metaphor is an appealing premise—Big, both Freaky Fridays and The Kid—and, amid toothless lesbian serial killers and vapid blondes killing vapid killers, 13 Going on 30 offers a pleasant enough diversion.
