"Whip It" Review

Whip It (2010)
Director: Drew Barrymore

Starring: Ellen Page, Drew Barrymore, Alia Shawkat, Kristen Wiig


Marketing can be a funny thing at times, especially when it comes to selling independent American films this side of the channel. This has been the case on a number of occasions, none more vivid in my mind than the quote from the Synecdoche, New York region 2 sleeve describing it as, and I quote "The most hilarious film you'll see this year". Clearly us Brits can't handle wonderfully created depictions of loneliness, so the distributors tend to hide these gems under a sugar coated comedy facade.


I would be a liar if I said I wasn't swayed by the advertising associated with a film, so when it came to taking my seat at the advance screening of Whip It, it was fairly safe to say that I had my doubts about what my feelings would be two hours later. Having being marketed as a film full of "girl power" and "a tale of friendship", there was always a thought that this would be some sappy, poorly written chick flick. The theory was backed up due to my understanding that this was actually based on a "teen novel..." With the solace that Ellen Page (Hard Candy, Juno) was in the lead role and Drew Barrymore (producer - Donnie Darko, He's Just Not That Into You)not only producing but directing the feature, I had a glimmer of hope.

Bliss Cavendar (Ellen Page) is a small-town misfit, an alter-ego seemingly perfected by Page in recent times, confined to beauty pagents due to minor emotional blackmail by her mother. On a day trip to Austin, Bliss comes across the tattooed, rock'n'roll "Hurl Scouts" roller derby team promoting the next meet in the city. A curious Bliss drags along her friend Pash (Alia Shawkat) to the event and soon enough, she's witnessing the exitable fury, and the "live for the moment lifestyle" she is experiencing in Austin.

However, the double life she is leading starts to plague her and decisions have to be made. Whip It is a wonderfully crafted tale of loyalties and the boundaries people will go to just to keep their friends and family happy. Unfortunately, marketing for this film will undoubtedly mean that it will have a limited audience of mainly 12-16 year old girls, which is a great shame as this is not only a great comedy gem, using more subtle techniques rather than laugh out loud moments, but also a memorable and heart-warming story. And for those of you who arent bothered about storyline, yeah, there's a lot of fishnet clad girls beating each other up...