16th
Film Review: Hannah Montana makes my heart warm and fuzzy
© Michelle Bollman
Published in the Lee Clarion, Spring 2009
An online version of this article can be found, here.
You know you’ve made it big when you have a cameo appearance in the latest tween fad movie, Hannah Montana or Miley Cyrus, whatever we’re calling her today.
Lee alumnus Jay DeMarcus, instrumentalist and vocalist for Rascal Flatts, has done just that, along with the rest of the Rascal Flatts clan, Tyra Banks and Taylor Swift… which leads to my first and only complaint about the popular teen star’s movie: what was with all of the guest apperences?
They really didn’t seem to fit the flow of the film. Miley Stewart (Miley Cyrus) walking into her small-town Tennessee living room only to have Rascal Flatts jamming with the fam or Taylor Swift playing at the town’s hoedown caught me off-guard more than anything.
Aside from those complaints, the rest of the movie was on the right track. I actually think I might have been more excited than my six and seven-year-old nieces when we saw the movie… on opening night, of course.
As my mind churned memories of the series’ television episodes I had watched over the years, I expected the big screen version to be just as predictable as the half-hour reruns, but I was shockingly surprised when the film presented depth, kept me wondering and spurred emotional epiphanies that I don’t think my nieces quite understood.
The theater was filled with more adults than little girls, actually. Of the entire, almost two-hour long film, what made me the giddiest was the happy ending, but I suppose that’s to be expected from a Disney film geared at 10-year-old girls.
And the singing and dancing? Well, the moves were pretty interesting while the music nearly rates higher than the movie in my book. So if you hear the Hannah Montana soundtrack blairing from a 21-year-old’s car, I’ll probably be singing along, word for word.
