Easy to love

Rating: 8/10 (23 December 2010)

Being a teenage girl is no easy task, believe me. In Jr. High I had a boyfriend and the first thing on young teenage minds is the curiosity if there is sex in the relationship, fun rumors began to spread and it was one of the worst times in my life. Funny enough, this isn't something that just started when I was a child, or my older sister or my mother or my grandmother. Girl's reputations have always been fragile since the beginning of time, even Shakespeare knew when he wrote Much Ado About Nothing. The Scarlet Letter challenged the double edged sword of how if a man sleeps with a woman, he's a pimp, a lady's man, or just simply "the Man". If a woman sleeps with a man, she doesn't get as kind treatment, we get the names "slut", "whore", or "tramp". No matter how much you know it's the truth that you're not those names, it hurts. But what if a girl actually took pride in those names and love the attention she got, even if it was too rough to handle? Emma Stone proving that she's leading lady material handles herself extremely well in this terrific re-imaging of The Scarlet Letter for teenagers that will prove to be more positive and every pre-adult lady should watch.
Like most high school kids, Olive Penderghast just wants to be popular. So much so that when her best friend, Rhiannon, asks Olive how her weekend went, she decides to whip up a spicy white lie just to make things interesting. But that minor exaggeration begins to take on a life of its own when it reaches the ears of motor-mouth gossip Jesus freak Marianne, and in no time the entire student body is abuzz over unassuming Olive's unrepentant weekend of debauchery. Of course not a word of it is true, but that doesn't stop everyone in school from talking, and an amused Olive from deciding to go with the flow. Playing the role of the hussy to the hilt, the girl who used to be invisible begins dressing provocatively and turning heads in the hallways. The students aren't the only ones taking notice, either; Olive's English teacher, Mr. Griffith, is concerned that the kind of attention she's receiving isn't healthy for a developing girl, and his wife, the school counselor, is in full agreement. As Olive takes note of the parallels between her own situation and the plight of the Scarlet Letter heroine Hester Prynne, she realizes that she may be able to manipulate her newfound notoriety to give fellow classmate Brandon's popularity a much-needed shot in the arm. Olive never thought her little game could possibly have any negative effect on anyone but herself, but when loose lips start sinking ships all around her, she realizes that it's high time for the truth to come out.
I think this is a very important film for girls because unfortunately this generation doesn't read as much as they should, plus as much as I loved the book The Scarlet Letter, it wouldn't appeal to everyone. We need a new update to grab someone's interest and I was really impressed with the way the cast and crew handled this film. Emma Stone has a lot of charisma, such maturity for a young lady and she carried herself so well. She even provides comic relief to give the drama little break. Same with Amanda Bynes, almost taking on the character played by Mandy Moore in Saved as the "holier than thou" bible thumper who feels that if you have sex before marriage, your soul is damned. Even Lisa Kudrow did a great job, as a high school counselor who puts Olive in a bad situation blaming Olive for her crime and you are just in shock and feel total sympathy for Olive when she realizes that her reputation is destroying her mentally. Easy A provides great education for both teens and adults(parents or soon to be parents) on how hard it can be to be a teenage girl. I wish that I had a film like this when I was 13 because I would have felt a lot better knowing that a lot of girls go through the same thing where you feel so hated for doing something that you didn't do. Easy A is easily one of the year's best films and I'm very happy with the way it was handled, very classy, sexy and funny, I would highly recommend it.
8/10