Review: Whip It!

With our free passes from the Barry Levinson no-show, we decided to give ourselves a treat.  No deep Belgian examination of some kid’s love/hate relationship with his mother, who happens to breed hamsters for a living, dreaming of someday stepping up to guinea pigs.  Nope, we went straight for the roller derby flick directed by first-time director Drew Barrymore.  I think this able young woman may have a future in the film business.

Whip it! begins with 17-year old Bliss Cavendar, played by Juno star Ellen Page, uncomfortably getting through a girls' beauty pageant, the kind that really make your stomach turn.  Similar to the character Juno, Bliss doesn’t feel at home amongst these people.  She doesn’t carry any particular grudge, she’s just looking for something different. By chance, Bliss stumbles upon the recently revived world of Roller Derby in Austin, Texas, not far from her native tiny-town Bordeen.  Immediately entranced by her new role models, Bliss tries out for and makes a team, fibbing about her age along the way.

Her new secret life as a roller derby star stresses out her relationships with her best friend Pash, her pushy beauty pageant mother (veteran actress Marcia Gay Harden), her football obsessed father, and her new rocker boyfriend Oliver.

Drew displays a good eye for comedy and for the most part avoids overly sappy moments.  Page, meanwhile, shows that she can still convincingly play a high school girl (I guess she was only 21 at the time of filming) and impressively uses no stunt double during the making of the film.  There’s a great supporting cast of roller derby tough girls, lead by the return of Julliette Lewis, who recently split from her band Juliette and the Licks, and Drew herself.

Whip it! delivers some good lines, doesn’t get overly predictable, and has fun characters.  You probably won’t see this one again and again, but it is a decent date flick.  My imdb rating: 7/10.