User Reviews

Rena, a teen ager living in a small community, is the by-product of parents that, having marrying young, don't have a clue as to how to bring up their children. Rena, not surprisingly, follows what other teens in the same situation have gone through. Her romance with a boy with Kenton, a rich boy produces a sad situation for Rena and her family.

Rena tried unsuccessfully to take her own life, but nothing happens. The next thing this young woman wants to do is to go to her father's picnic that will take place in the prison where he is serving a sentence. Rena wants to tell him about the impending changes in her life. What happens in that fated outing will not only transform Rena's life, but also her brother Jay will comes to terms with a problem that is troubling him, his own homosexuality.

"American Girl" is a dark comedy directed by Jordan Brady. The screen play is by Scott Sandoe. Mr. Brady has given the film a light touch instead of going for a more dramatic take that wouldn't have helped the project.

Jena Malone is a young actress who is a natural for the movies, as proved by her other appearances, notably in "Saved". She carries the movie and makes the viewer feel for her Rena, who in another type of environment and with another family, would have turned out differently. The brother Jay is played by Brad Renfro, another young actor who has been seen in other quirky films. Alicia Witt, who plays Barby, the sarcastic half-sister, doesn't have much to do. Michelle Forbes and Chris Mulkey portray the parents of this confused family. Clifton Collins Jr. has a good opportunity as Buddy, the man that clarifies things for the confused Jay.

The film shows a reality that is seldom seen in other mainstream films in which teens are happy and carefree, which might be right, but they haven't have to deal with what life has given Rena and her family.

****Minor spoilers (I guess)****

For those of us who tire of standard teen movies, here's the film to brighten our day. It's a monkey wrench in the cranks of the tedious genre that features actors in their mid-twenties portraying stereotypical high-school characters shamelessly indulging predictable plots of frivolous romance. Where most movies set in high schools find resolve in romantics, "American Girl" dares to be different.

Yet it contains all the usual ingredients-aimless main characters, one-dimensional side characters, high school, moronic parents, sexual revelations, a romance-but it tastes different. This movie doesn't believe high school is the root of youth complications; it knows that school isn't where the confusion lies-it's after graduation when the complexities begin.

The reason why I liked this film is because it was filmed within a fifty mile radius of my home when it was filmed (I moved after that). The characters were extremely quirky and odd. "American Girl" was clever, cynical and another underrated film. Erik Von Detten was psychotic, and Jena Malone was eye candy, not to mention gives an excellent performance.

I was immediately reminded of "Ghost World" with a bit of "Blue Car", another slacker flick that has strong female characters. Rena (Jena Malone) is a depressed young girl living in a trailer park and has no idea what to do with her future, yet this is not your typical high school/slacker movie.

So one day, instead of re-locating, she decides to kill herself. But she has to tell her father, in prison, that she is pregnant.

Chris Mulkey as Rena's imprison father John, gives a hilarious supporting performance.

Very cynical and dark...at times even funny! One of the most underrated and best films of 2002! If you like "Election", "Ghost World" and "Blue Car", you'll love this! I put in this movie expecting a quirky, fun, romantic comedy. Uh uh! (The cover is deceptive). That's not to say I didn't enjoy it immensely, it just leaves a bittersweet taste in your mouth. Jena Malone is fantastic as the disenchanted, troubled teenage kleptomaniac-cum-pregnant girl struggling to find meaning in her life. This sense of meaning and purpose is really hard to find. There are so many sad, depressing, uncomfortable moments in this movie yet it is acted so well and is so thought-provoking you can forgive it's few foibles. Highly recommended, but be warned, if you're feeling down or depressed - avoid at all costs! Watch it when in a reflective mood or you are looking for inspiration if you are a writer/poet/film buff etc.Unlike so many fabricated teen characters in film and TV, Malone's Rena is refreshing in that she never hits a false note, putting Rena's raw emotions right on the surface - she's a first-class talent and can take her place next to Alison Lohman, Lauren Ambrose, Agnes Bruckner and Thora Birch as one of the most arresting actresses to look out for in her age group.So in conclusion, the bottom line is that this movie is a well acted, underrated, little movie. If you like Jena Malone, you should watch this. My score. . . 7 out of 10. Definitely worth seeing.

The only reason I gave this movie a two was because it had nice lighting. The actors were all well-lit, and they all looked fairly nice. Except the dad, who looked pretty rough. Oh, and the colours were nice; some interesting compositions in the frame (to take us away from the blasé story, of course) This was a movie that went nowhere. If you loved Election, Blue Car and American Beauty; if you love film-making and want to see films that have scripts that are finely hued and well-thought out; if you like a certain degree of artistry present in a film, or even if you just like to watch a dang good flick, avoid this at all costs.

It's a film that goes nowhere and fulfills nothing. We rented it because of what was written on the back, but it was deceitful. It's not a black comedy because three funny moments do not a funny black movie make. Lifting the "kid constantly trying to off herself" concept straight from Harold and Maude is nothing short of thievery. Oh, no, wait, it's cleverly done because she tries to use a plastic fork... that's right. Even the half-hearted attempt to tackle a somewhat taboo subject (which might really take it into "black" comedy territory, or at least "black" something) like incest is thwarted by this throwaway line about the character's "dead" father, obviously saying that this father isn't her blood father anyway, so, phew, it's not so bad. And, like everything else in this movie, that subplot died a thin death with no resolution.

So not only was this film lame, but spineless, too. It was too scared to tackle a real, disturbing issue with a certain degree of resonance, in preference of the "disney world" subtext.

One of my problems with this film was that it just didn't seem well thought out. The dialogue felt sloppy and obvious. The characters were cardboard characters; the slutty daughter, the suicidal daughter, the pot smoking mom, the dad who just doesn't give a sh*t and never did... the mom writing postcards to the daughter, signing them "love dad", so she'd at least feel like he loved her; It had some interesting ideas buried way beneath the melodrama and weak storyline. It's too bad it was treated with such a heavy hand.

Hey, who wants to watch a "dark comedy" about a trailer park teen who gets knocked-up and decides she wants to tell her lifer dad about it at the upcoming prison picnic? It's got Jenna Malone in it, that girl in "Saved!" and "Donnie Darko". Sounds like fun, huh? Honestly, it totally does to me, though I tend to gravitate to dysfunctional family indy flicks. But, and I really hate to say it, this movie was a really, really boring watch - every time I looked at the DVD display I was shocked anew at how little movie time had elapsed compared to the eons it felt like. Some kind of reverse "dog years" effect kicks in when one is profoundly bored.

And closing my eyes didn't help because I could still hear the atrocious dialog. I found myself wondering aloud how much of it was ad-libbed because I couldn't imagine anyone would sign on to the script if the lines I was hearing were actually put to paper. Whatever the secret to its non-success, the end result was the same: either the writer, the cast, or both were unable to milk anything from the weak setup almost every scene was saddled with. Yes, there was the occasional one-liner that was obviously too witty to have been made up on the spot - but those bright spots stuck out like sore thumbs because they were drowned in oceans of pointless, rambling, non-interactive dialog. You could probably scrape together enough of those snappy lines to make a good trailer, but that I can't confirm as there was no trailer supplied on the DVD (for this movie anyway - lame - I consider the inclusion of a trailer the minimum standard for "special" features).

Also the half-hearted suicide scenes were not fun at all to watch - not because I imagined that she would actually kill herself (this time), but because such botched attempts in real-life would likely yield permanent neck injuries or severed wrist tendons, so I was left with nothing but a cringing response. The plastic spork, the broken photo frame glass, and the flimsy macrame noose tied with a bad knot to the rickety old branch (which of the three will give out, you wonder, because one absolutely must for this overly simplistic movie to drearily continue), I mean, come on. And the suicider as a humorous element has been to much better effect in other movies ("Crimes of the Heart" comes to mind), though I can never fully get into it myself.

I don't make the rules, but the bottom line is movies that don't have much in the way of action must then rely on and have some kind of payout in the dialog department. The cardinal sin of this movie is that it has nether. Maybe for dyed-in-the-wool Jenna Malone fans, definitely for film school freshmen who need instruction on how NOT to make a movie, others should sit this one out (consider yourself warned). After our viewing the DVD went immediately into the "give it away, sell it, but for pity's sake keep it away from the collection or we might accidentally watch it again someday" pile. Two stars.