Whip It

Bliss is a young high school student that is trapped in her mothers’ world of Texas debutants and beauty pageants. She is entranced by the world of Women’s’ Roller Derby and sets off to try out for the team, even though she is a minor and her parents will never approve.

This was Drew Barrymore’s directorial debut, and wasn’t too shabby. The story itself is predictable enough, but the dialogue is sharp and really funny. I was a tad disappointed by the pacing of the movie. It was unnecessarily slow, and had about two or three tandem story lines that were never fully fleshed out and seemed to slow down the plot even more.

Barrymore was also in the movie, and frankly should have stayed behind the camera. Her character was annoying and distracting. The rest of the cast however does a great job, particularly Kristen Wiig, as fellow roller derbiette and Marcia Gay Harden and Daniel Stern as Bliss’s parents.

This isn’t that great of a movie, it was slow and predictable, but the actors, for the most part, were great and again the dialogue is what makes it worth watching. Nothing to run out and see, but still kind of entertaining.

** ½ Rentable

Rated PG-13 (for language and sexual content)