![]() ![]() Grown-up girls may find Claire and Hailey familiar and poignant, as they spend their 13-year-old summer wanting desperately to be older. Rated PG for mild language and sensuality. Directed by Elizabeth Allen, from a screenplay by John Quaintance and Jessica Bendinger, based on a short story by Alice Hoffman. ![]() Showtimes and trailer "Aquamarine," with Emma Roberts, Joanna "JoJo" Levesque, Sara Paxton, Jake McDorman, Arielle Kebbel. As one of the characters tells us, love is the closest thing we have to magic - and that's a sweet message for any age. But it takes a surprising turn in its final act, as the girls learn a lesson about friendship and love. Its screenplay too often seems to be treading water, and the directing (by first-timer Elizabeth Allen) is undistinguished, relying too often on squeals from the ever-excitable Claire and Hailey for drama. Summer vacation just got a lot more exciting.īased on a short story of the same name by Alice Hoffman ("Practical Magic"), this sparkly fairy tale won't hold much interest for those outside the tween-girl demographic. She's a reality show waiting to happen, and the 13-year-old pals who find her, Claire (Emma Roberts) and Hailey (Joanna "JoJo" Levesque), stare at her in fascination. Although next time, I think I'll pick the movie."Aquamarine" presents its young audience with a charming quandary: What's a girl to do when she finds a mermaid in her beach-club swimming pool? The sea maiden (Sara Paxton), whose name is Aquamarine, looks like a supermodel, sports cute blue highlights in her long blond hair (which, as luck and a PG rating would have it, just happens to cover her bare chest) and has a nice mastery of sarcasm. All in all, it wasn't a great movie, but it picks up in the second half and finishes well, so it was a pretty decent way to spend almost two hours on a cold Saturday afternoon. I wasn't expecting much from Sara Paxton (the titular mermaid Aquamarine) judging by the painful "I see we're going to have to take this slow: Mer Maid" in the trailers, but she ended up doing okay. And I was extremely, pleasantly surprised. I knew it wasn't exactly fair writing her off for being a singer, but that's what I did. I wasn't expecting much out of JoJo (bold and strong Hailey) at all. Her over-the-top mugging drives me insane. I thought her early Unfabulous days were good, but now I can barely stand to watch the show. I think Emma Roberts (timid and diminutive Claire) may be a rare star who started out acting fairly well and is getting worse. But in the end I stayed for the movie, giving me plenty of time to think over my criticisms. I must admit I was much more entertained with thinking of ways that I could sneak in to The Hills Have Eyes, which was playing at the theater across from ours. The movie starts off extremely slow and was, in my opinion, painful to watch. So fifteen dollars later we were all nestled in. I was pushing for Failure to Launch or She's the Man, but my sister was determined to see Aquamarine. I promised my sister I would take her to a movie for her birthday and buy her popcorn a few weeks ago, and today was the day we settled on.
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