10 Things I Hate About You

Rating: 7/10 (13 June 2005)

I saw this once before during my secondary school days, possibly in one of my classes, I knew it was a modern retake of the William Shakespeare story The Taming of the Shrew, in the similar field to Clueless, but I had to see it again to get a better opinion, from director Gil Junger (Black Knight). Basically Cameron James (Inception's Joseph Gordon-Levitt) is the new student at Padua High, shown around by his new friend Michael Eckman (David Krumholtz), told about the different types of student that he will be hanging around. On the tour he notices beautiful second year student Bianca Stratford (Larisa Oleynik) and has an instant attraction to her, and neither is her older indie rock loving "shrew" sister Katarina 'Kat' (Julia Stiles) does, and she is not allowed to date either. But their father Walter (The Nutty Professor's Larry Miller) changes this house rule, Bianca is allowed to date, but only when Kat starts dating, but of course she is not interested in dating at all, so Cameron has to find someone who can turn her around. Michael decides to help him by tricking pretty boy jerk Joey Donner (Andrew Keegan) that he will be able to get Bianca if he pays outcast Patrick Verona (Heath Ledger) to date Kat, they seem a good match though because they are both as rebellious and ill-tempered as each other. Patrick does go along with this plan for the money, and he does everything he can think to convince Kat that he does have a thing for her, and meanwhile Cameron tries to get closer to Bianca, who is of course pestered by Joey. After winning her over with a rendition of "Can't Take My Eyes Off You" in front of the soccer team and with the help of the school band, Patrick has truly fallen for Kat, and he happily invites her to the prom. Bianca and her do attend with their father's permission, Cameron is happy to be taking his love interest as her date, but Joey finds out, and he confronts Patrick about their deal, loud enough for Kat to hear. While Joey is punched and lying on the floor, and Cameron and Bianca are happy and share their first true love kiss (second technically), she and her sister are closer because of the dilemmas, and Patrick wins Kat back buying a guitar she wanted and convincing her he really loves her, and they have their first kiss. Also starring Susan May Pratt as Mandella, Bad Boys II's Gabrielle Union as Chastity, Galaxy Quest's Daryl 'Chill' Mitchell as Mr. Morgan and American Beauty's Allison Janney as Ms. Perky. The cast all do their parts (some possibly a little stereotypical) really well, Stiles memorable as the sulky older sister, Ledger as the cool good looking guy who doesn't play by the rules, and Gordon-Levitt as the nice guy wanting the girl. You can recognise the Shakespearean elements in the story, and being set in a modern high school it makes the story still very engaging, and it gives way for some good music, a good teen love story with some funny moments, and a film that is fun for the adolescent and adult audiences, a fun romantic comedy. Very good!