Dirty Girl (2010)

Director: Abe Sylvia

Writer: Abe Sylvia

Starring: Juno Temple, Jeremy Dozier, Mila Jovovich, Mary Steenburgen

Rated: R (sexual content including graphic nudity, language)

Firstly, sorry it’s taken so long to get back on track. (Finals…) But anyway, now that I’m on Christmas break hopefully I’ll get back in the groove!

So last night I watched Dirty Girl. Never heard of it? Neither had I. To be honest I was really dreading watching it because the trailer looked terrible. But I judged too quickly. At least I think I did…

The movie takes place in Oklahoma in 1987 and it’s centered around high school “dirty girl,” Danielle (Juno Temple) who, because of her oh-so-slutty ways, has been placed “with the retards.” (Does it sound offensive yet? Don’t worry it isn’t as bad as it seems.) Basically her principle hasn’t been impressed by her promiscuity and as a sort of punishment places her in a school program for troubled students called “Challengers,” in which she is teamed up with Clarke (Jeremy Dozier), a shy, gay outcast, to work on a project.

Meanwhile at home – because mentioning family life would probably be important as well – Danielle lives with her sweet and very young mother, Sue-Ann (Mila Jovovich) who is soon to be married to this kind of annoying Mormon guy (William H. Macy) who’s already got two really annoying kids. Danielle isn’t too fond of any of them – including her mother – and pretty much spends most of her time not helping out by constantly acting out.

Clarke lives with his loving, yet easily intimidated, mother (Mary Steenburgen) and homophobic father (Dwight Yoakam) who’s not the nicest of men out there as he tends to act violently at any sign of “gay behavior” from his son.  

So…Danielle and Clarke start to spend time with each other as they work on their project (taking care of a flour sack). Then, after discovering the identity of Danielle’s father, the two set off for California in hopes of finding him.

Okay so there’s kind of a lot to this movie as you may be able to tell. It’s kind of all over the place and not the easiest to explain. (I left a lot out to spare you a fair share of literary confusion). I can’t really tell if I liked it or not to be honest. The first half an hour or so was surprisingly funny (a whole bunch of crude humor) but beyond the humor the content was actually pretty serious and really quite sad. I mean there’s a ton of verbal abuse from father to gay son, which I’m sure hits very close to home for a lot of people and then this whole sub plot of hating your single parent and wanting to find the other one in hopes they’ll be better, which, again, I’m sure many can relate to.

What was weird though, was that at some parts the movie wasn’t trying to be touching but then at others I could tell it was and to be completely honest, it was during the effortless parts that I felt the most invested and even kind of emotional. I think with as little as twenty-five percent less cheesiness (such as lines and music) the film could have been way better because it was when they weren’t trying to make me really feel for the characters that I did the most. For example just observing Danielle’s typical relationship with her mother made me just feel terrible for both of them, yet lucky that my relationship with my own mother is healthy . If or when you watch the movie, you’ll probably see what I mean when I say that some of the script was too cheesy for words and that the soundtrack was a little much at times, but when neither of these applied, the movie was actually kind of decent.

*SPOILER ALERT* Don’t read the next two paragraphs if you don’t want spoilers. Just to add on to what I was just saying and to end this really awkward review, I wanted to quickly discuss a scene I thought was really well done and one I thought was too much.

So Danielle does eventually make it to her father’s house. Her mother, who had gone after her along with Clarke’s mother, had made it there before her, and attempts to discourage Danielle from meeting her father. Danielle then runs away in order to avoid her mothers grasp and ends up in her fathers backyard where she finds him grilling burgers – a very stereotypical “dad activity.” The scene then patiently progresses as the two briefly talk and introduce themselves to each other. At one point her father’s young daughter comes out and Danielle is introduced as one of her father’s students. In tears Danielle meets her father’s little girl and honestly it’s really damn emotional. I mean despite a whole lot of stupid things that happened leading up to this moment, I was actually feeling like if I were a tad more invested in the movie I might have teared up a little bit. But don’t let that make you think its Oscar-worthy because, trust me, it isn’t.

The other scene that I thought was just ridiculous was the last scene where Danielle is performing in the talent show singing Melissa Manchester’s “Don’t Cry Out Loud” – a song Clarke had thought of performing earlier on in the film. (By the way she’s doing it solo because Clarke’s father had sent him off to Military School - I told you there was a lot going on in this movie). The scene wouldn’t have been so bad if Clarke hadn’t shown up out of freaking nowhere to finish the song with Danielle having randomly returned home (like what?) I don’t know it was just painful to watch.

*NO MORE SPOILERS* So this review I’m sure was all over the place and not very well organized, but to be fair neither was the movie! Hopefully you’re able to make sense out of what I’m trying to say about this film but if not I’ll sum it up real quick.

Basically I didn’t think this movie was great; it made me cringe at times and just feel really confused at others. However…the acting was actually very good despite the kind of terrible script and about seventy-five percent of the jokes are pretty funny if you’re into crude humor. It wasn’t worthy of an award or anything but really, Rotten Tomatoes, I think it deserves a little better than a 27%. But that’s just my opinion…