Starring Hilary
Duff, Chad Michael Murray. Written by Leigh Dunlap. Directed by Mark
Rosman. (G) 95 min. Opens July 16.
The finale of Hilary
Duff's last magnum opus, The Lizzie McGuire Movie, was a bold
departure from tween-flick convention. Instead of partnering Duff
with her obvious love interest, a swoonsome Eurotrash-oid named
Paolo, McGuire was instead deposited in the arms of Gordo, her nerdy,
obsessive best friend.
Such inclusiveness may
have proved too much for the Duffmeister's youthful audience,
however. Lizzie McGuire, kissing a nerd? The horror, the horror! Or
as Joseph Conrad might have said: "Like, eee-yeww!" Well,
young'uns fret ye not, because the moral order of the universe
is realigned with A Cinderella Story, and this time round Duff's
boyfriend Austin (Chad Michael Murray, who was also Lindsay Lohan's
boy in Freaky Friday) is appropriately smokin' hot. Plus, he's
no geek either, but the captain of the football team — and the
high school president! And he quotes Tennyson over email! Could one
young man ever contain so much perfection? (Except Nick Carter, of
course.)
Most of Cinderella is
played in the now boringly familiar Clueless style, as a modern
reworking set in the San Fernando Valley. Duff plays orphaned high
school senior Sam, who's banished to live with her demented
stepsisters and tanning-machine-obsessed stepmom Fiona (played by
Jennifer Coolidge as a moving, seal-killing slick of botox). By day,
Duff slaves away as a waitress at Fiona's crass 1950s
roller-diner; by night she sends anonymous instant messages to
Austin, her mystery Prince Charming.
The couple finally meet
at a school costume ball — with the part of the glass slipper
played, inevitably, by a cellphone — but the skullheaded Austin
is unable to penetrate Duff's ultra-cunning disguise, a teensy
white Phantom mask. No worries, though: both are happily ever after
by the final reel, especially Murray, who puts in a charismatic spot
amid the mostly tiresome slaptstick. Duff, meanwhile, may not have
fellow tweener Lindsay Lohan's skill for picking scripts (this
is no Mean Girls), but she remains much the better performer.