Ah another Mother's Day has come and gone and 'twas a day of giving to the women that begat us into this world.  Apart from the flowers and cards, I decided to treat my mother and 6 year old sister to a movie.  I gave them a choice between An American Haunting or Stick It.  Luckily, they chose Stick It, because the former looked pretty bad.

Anyhow, Stick It is the directorial debut of Jessica Bedinger.  She is more recognized as the writer of the cult cheerleading classic, Bring It On, well barely recognized.  Stick It is focused on the sport of female gymnastics and is depicted in a way that makes me never want to have a daughter participate in it.  The story focuses around a character named Haley played by the absolutely gorgeous Missy Peregrym.  She pretty much is the redundant story of the bad apple on the other side of the tracks that left her team but is forced to compete with them one more time.  She goes through many emotional rollar coasters throughout the film, and eventually realizes that sports are more team oriented rather then individual.

But I say who cares?  I didn't not want to see this movie because of its plot.  I wanted to see women competing in spandex uniforms doing splits, flips, and handstands.  As for director Bedinger, she blew me away with her abilites as a flimmaker.  The little things that she adds to this film, such as the schematic images and the color schemes are awesome and really give this film some flavor.  Bendinger was a photographer before getting into films and it shows.  Every shot has some sort of scheme or theme to it and it makes the film that much better.  The gymnastic sequences are truly amazing, almost too amazing.  Some of the stunts are obviously CGI and computer generated, but I liked it.  It gave gymnastics a flare that I never knew existed.  The girls were beautiful and were VERY funny.  Especially Peregrym and Vanessa Lengies.  Some of their remarks are pure hilarity and even had me, a 20 year old man, laughing my ass off.

As for the negatives, some of the minor characters were complete insults to the art of acting.  Their spoken words were painfully stiff and it really made it annoying whenever they were on screen.  Particuarly Peregrym's two male goons that she hung out with.  I was waiting to see a cue card reflected in a window because the way they spoke their lines was pathetic.  No voice inflection or different pitches or anything.  And it's truly a shame because the girls in this film and Jeff Bridges played their parts to the tee.  They were beliveable athletes and I had no doubts in their abilities.  But whoever those two friends were, BLACKBALL THEM IMMEDIATELY.  They should never work again.  I have seen other reviews for this film and the dialogue seems to be a real weak point and is the reason for many lackluster reviews.  The dialouge isn't bad, it's the way the actors spoke it.  What a shame.

Overall I really enjoyed this movie.  My mother did and my sister did as well.  Now that's three different demographics and all three liked it.  Why this film isn't doing better I don't know.  Maybe people just don't recognize Peregrym as a leading role.  But I tell you what, Missy Peregrym has the acting talent, she has the looks, and she has the athletic ability to take on tough roles.  I really hope she gets more work due to this film.

*** out of ****        

  

I want to go see this. The end of the trailer I saw online was funny as heck. ha ha.

I'll definitly go see this as soon as I can!

Why would anyone actually want to watch this movie? I just can't wrap my head around how somebody could say, "hmmm, that looks like it's gonna be good". It would probably be better for anyone who does want to watch it, to watch it with the mute button on. Then you could just see it for what it is, just hot chicks as eye candy to get people in theatres.