Its an all too common story. One minute youre a little girl talking to an alien, then youre a teenaged party animal before next becoming a popular romantic comedy lead. Now brace yourself for Drew Barrymores most recent incarnation. She is now A Quite Good Indie Director.
Drew Barrymores directorial debut died on its arse at the box office and to be fair, its not hard to see why. The title Whip It sounds shit (the book its based on is called Derby Girl, which would have been better) and Barrymore herself complained that the film was primarily marketed as a roller derby movie. This seems an odd criticism, because it really is a roller derby movie. But its undeniably a tough sell making it sound good to anyone who hasnt seen it.
Ellen Page plays the teenaged heroine Bliss Cavendar, who is suffering the indignity of being entered into a perpetual round of beauty pageants by her conservative mother (Harden). Hanging out with her friend Pash (Arrested Development star Shawkat), Bliss stumbles across the world of roller derby, essentially as one character describes it a lot of girls in fishnets and roller skates beating the crap out of each other. Bliss lies about her age and unbeknownst to her parents joins the team. Before long shes enjoying a sporting life only slightly less brutal than James Caans in Rollerball and has provoked the scorn of ageing player Iron Maven (Lewis) as well as the romantic interest of a grungy teen band member.
Not everything in the film works. The stuff about beauty pageants at the start seems a bit odd and out of place. Director Drew Barrymore is ironically fairly bad in a supporting acting role. And, least convincingly of all, we are asked to believe Ellen Pages 17 year old character could convincingly pass for a 22 year old. The fact that Ellen Page is in fact 23 now in real life doesnt help. She looks like shes about 14.
None of this really matters though: Whip It overflows with charm. It looks like it was a lot of fun to make and for once this is captured on the screen. It has a great soundtrack, an abundance of characters with roller derby nicknames like Eva Destruction and Babe Ruthless, a great cast which even finds a place for the least famous Wilson brother, Andrew. Juliette Lewis who presumably must have competed for parts with Barrymore during the latters 90s bad girl period is also good in a slightly contrived role.
There are only a few extras here an interview with Barrymore and some fairly uninteresting deleted scenes.
But the film itself is definitely worth a watch.
Overall Verdict: A promising directorial debut from Barrymore and much better than it sounds.
Special Features:
Deleted Scenes
Interviews
Reviewer: Chris Hallam