She's the Man

Rating: 7/10 (21 March 2016)

Bringing all of the gender confusion and love triangulating of William Shakespeare's Twelfth Night to a high school setting was a wonderful way to bring the bard's work to a younger generation. Andy Fickman's 2006 film She's the Man starring Amanda Bynes and Channing Tatum remained faithful to the 1601 work of Shakespeare with perfectly modern twists to engage a brand new audience. Much like Twelfth Night (1996), She;s the Man stayed true to Shakespeare's theme of gender confusion, She's the Man also brings secrecy and betrayal to the forefront more so than the bard himself. Even with gender roles reversed and interchangeable, the overarching message in She's the Man is what it means to confide in someone and how damaging it can be when trust is broken.
High school student Viola Hastings (Amanda Bynes) is a star soccer player on her girl's soccer team. For Viola, soccer is life, which is why she feels as though her life is over when her school's girl's soccer team is cut. Viola and some of the girls go to the boy's soccer team and ask if they can join. Viola is sure that they will comply as her boyfriend is the goalie of the boy's team and has expressed to Viola that her talent exceeds half of the members of his team. When the boys scoff at the idea of having girls on their team and refuse the girls, Viola seeks revenge. Viola then learns that her twin brother Sebastian (James Kirk), newly enrolled at a new high school, is fleeing with his band for London and will miss his first two weeks of school. Viola decides to go to the new high school in her brother's place, make the soccer team, and beat her own high school's boys soccer team exacting revenge on her school and ex-boyfriend. Viola didn't expect to fall in love with her roommate Duke (Channing Tatum) who is trying to seduce the popular Olivia (Laura Ramsey). Olivia connects with Sebastian/Viola and eventually falls in love with her, not knowing, of course, that Sebastian is Viola in disguise. Calamity ensues when the real Sebastian returns from London early, unaware that he has been replaced at his school by his sister.
The connections all throughout She's the Man to Twelfth Night were a pure joy for this literature buff. The artful ways in which they brought pieces of Shakespeare's tale of the modern day were wonderful. I especially appreciated naming the rival school that Viola attends in Sebastian's place that of the town Viola washed upon after the shipwreck in Twelfth Night. I also enjoyed the naming of the spider in She's the Man to bring about the source inspiration, as well. I especially enjoy a reimagined film that pays proper tribute to the version it is reimagining. The acting is nothing to write home about. It is a teen comedy with younger actors playing teenagers, nothing extraordinary, but all parts were played adequately. The music was the real clincher for She's the Man. The upbeat fun music really made the transformation for the bard's work of aristocracy to the high school halls in a great way.
As mentioned before, and fleshed out in another review, Twelfth Night deals heavily with the theme of gender confusion, likewise, She's the Man does the same with the main character Viola dressing as her brother. What She's the Man does that Twelfth Night didn't do is focus primarily on secrets and betrayal. Much more emphasis was placed upon the secret Viola was keeping from her roommate in She's the Man than Viola's secret she was keeping from the Count in Twelfth Night. It was interesting to see that turn and the prominence placed on secret keeping in the reimagined work. Even the film's tagline begins with "Everybody has a secret...". The emphasis on this film certainly lies within all of the mini betrayals between the gender confusion, and all others involved with it. The shift from the curse of love to trust and secrets was an interesting choice and made for a slightly more engaging film. There's something in this film for everyone, and even if you ignore the bard's inspiration in the film, you will still come away enjoying it.