Surprisingly Funny Girl Power Celebration

Rating: 7/10 (22 March 2006)

"She's The Man" is a surprisingly funny take on gender roles in high school sports.
As even more loosely based on Shakespeare's "Twelfth Night" than the rock musical "Your Own Thing", with just a bit more effort it could have been up to the level of the previous bard teen adaptation "10 Things I Hate About You" by the same co-writers Karen McCullah Lutz and Kirsten Smith.
The film's good spirits lift it above difficulties that it unnecessarily sets up. Amanda Bynes is plucky but not very physically convincing as an athlete, particularly compared to Keira Knightley in "Bend It Like Beckham" or Blake Lively in "The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants", even with stunt doubles on the field.
She's also not helped by the odd casting decision to surround her with older hunky and beautiful actors and actresses in their mid-20's who would look old in a frat party movie, even if maybe she's supposed to be a freshman among seniors. The jock object of her hidden affection (Channing Tatum as "Duke Orsini") only sounds good in a towel, and is so supposedly tongue-tied with girls, that I was convinced by her argument to competitor "Olivia" on all the reasons not to date him so I couldn't figure out why she otherwise would want to. His one discussion about what he would really like from a relationship with a girl is very weak.
The script goes out of its way to avoid sexual orientation issues for its below 12 target audience, who I assume are familiar, as I am not, with Bynes's TV work. There's an implicitly gay hairdresser who for some reason hangs out with teen age girls, unless we weren't told that he's a fellow student who works at a salon, and there's several spontaneously enthusiastic embraces between a guy and the disguised "Viola" as "Sebastian" that turn awkward, but there's not a single homophobic accusation or coming out by any one. If it weren't for the cell phones and Nike symbol on the girls' soccer team uniforms I wouldn't have even thought this Illyria Prep was in the U.S. today.
While it's too bad that the girls don't take up any Title IX cudgels or consider more recruitment when their soccer team is canceled for lack of participation, the film seems to positively say that there's issues of expectations as to why the girls' soccer training isn't as tough, not lack of skills and motivation among the girls. So too bad "Viola/Sebastian" stereotypically faints at the sight of a dissected frog in science class.
While not near "Transamerica" issues of course, Bynes's mannerisms are not too credible when she's being a boy (though the quick edits of her trying to learn to imitate boys and her quick switching at a carnival are fun), but she's at her best as a rebel at the ball. Unlike other girls' sports movies, there is an intriguing parallel story about débutante expectations that skirts the tomboy issues by showing that girls can knock down opponents on the field then get prettied up and get the guy too.
Too bad many of the positive images of women are lost when scantily clad cheerleaders suddenly appear to shake at the soccer match, but maybe that was to balance the many guys in the shower scenes in case director Andy Fickman thought this could ever possibly be a date movie. (The few teen boys at my matinée showing were clearly there to mock the film.) They do try to PC up the side story of the geeky girl in glasses and braces, but she's played too much for stereotyped laughs before she too gets a guy when she becomes a bit of a swan.
David Cross's principal was silly, but Shakespeare had clowns too.
Though there's a running musical joke that the "Viola/Sebastian"s cell phone ring sounds embarrassingly girly pop, the music selections were surprisingly not pop. They miss an opportunity to make a point as well done with a similar mood or lyrics in "Freaky Friday", but there's posters on the walls and selections by rockers All-American Rejects and O.A.R., as well as by Joan Jett and indie romantic crooner Ray LaMontagne. Nice touch that the twin brother is a rocker with sensitively written lyrics is how he captures "Olivia"s heart, which is not much more rationale than the original Will provided.
All in all, the film was a surprisingly entertaining girl power celebration, with lots of laugh out loud opportunities. I will now laugh at tampons in a way I never thought to before.