Barbie Princess Charm School

a review


You can tell she’s a princess
She doesn’t need a crown
You can tell she’s a princess
She’ll turn the world around


These lines are from the movie’s opening song, “You Can Tell She’s a Princess.” Whether it’s suggesting that you can tell she is a princess because she doesn’t need a crown, or that her non-crown-requirement is a separate clause from the obviousness of her princessiness...I’m not sure. But in either case, she can turn the world around.

As the song plays, Barbie is seen opening up her chic little perfectly cute café.

Judging by the shadows cast, it opens at around noon.

There’s a fast-forward montage of Barbie taking orders, serving customers, and cleaning up, which, because of the direct-to-video quality of the character models, looks an awful lot like The Sims when you click play-speed-x2.  No other employees are seen, so we might assume Barbie really does everything at Café Gardania. I imagine she troubleshoots the internet terminals, unclogs the toilets, and lifts heavy boxes in the back (all while in fashionable shoes, of course).

But it’s not a perfect life. Tired and worn, she walks home to her apartment next to the overhead railway line.

And you know it’s not the best part of the neighborhood because the trains are vandalized with bacon-themed graffiti.

A young girl in street clothes and a tiara skips happily around the living room as she watches the “144th Princess Procession” on television. Barbie comes home and greets the young girl by spontaneously asking to dance with her, in the princessy way you would expect. The girl offers Barbie a crown, but Barbie says, “I am so not a princess!” to which the girl answers, “Every girl’s a princess! Some of them just have fancier crowns.” But then again, a lot of girls don’t have crowns at all and - no, never mind, forget I brought it up.

Anyway it turns out the two are sisters, and they’re worried about their mother. And it turns out Barbie isn’t Barbie! She’s Blair. I mean, it’s Barbie as Blair. Which is to say it’s a character in the role of a character, sort of like how in The Muppet Christmas Carol, Kermit was Kermit, but Kermit as Bob Crachit and … look, I just want you to know who I’m talking about when I said “Blair” from now on.
I’ve gotta mention that Blair and the girl’s mom looks roughly the same age as Barbie/Blair.

Possibly a bit younger.

But she is sick - after all, she’s wearing a bathrobe and walks with a cane. Whatever ailment she’s actually suffering from is never directly mentioned. But this is probably for the better, since a Barbie movie isn’t exactly the place for the dramatic use of, say, cancer.

The procession that Emily (oh, the girl’s name is Emily, by the way) is watching shows the headmistress of Princess Charm School explaining how, even though most princesses become princesses by royal bloodline, every year, by lottery, one normal citizen of Gardania wins a scholarship to the school. You know, just like a real school.

AAAAGH

This year’s winner: Blair Willows! It turns out that Emily had been entering her big sister’s name “five or six times. A day. For the entire year.” Unbeknownst to Blair herself! Then, in a weird hurrying-the-story-along moment, a chauffeur from the school rings the doorbell. This is seconds after the girls see the name drawn on television. Maybe it was a pre-recorded broadcast, and the guy was just standing there, waiting until just seconds after the announcement to ring the bell. Perhaps even keeping his ear against the door to listen to time it right. But also it suggests that he got to the door within the few minutes after Blair arrived home from work. Yep, that’s exactly what happened, I bet.

Blair is hesitant at first. After all, she reasons, she’s just a waitress! Since she was the one to open and close the place and did everything I sort of figured she owned it or something, but we’re made to believe her job position is more lowly than that.

Café Gardania patrons enjoy ketchup with their coffee and baked goods.

Mom helps convince Blair that a position as a lady royal would help change their lives forever. So from that one bullet point and a couple of meaningful looks, Blair surprisingly quickly changes her mind and emphatically decides she will go after all. Goodbyes and had and she walks outside to be greeted by...

...this. Wow

But oh no! On her way riding down the street that luckily has no other traffic, the carriage hits a stone, causing her to smudge her lipstick! And she spills her cup of tea! This helps to build up a sense of suspense as to whether or not she’s really cut out for this whole “princess” thing.

She arrives at the school (a centuries-old castle), which, by the way, has a few tiny fairies flying through it, and is greeted by a friendly, energetic labrador retriever. Her reaction is to return its affection (er, not in the same way) as opposed to still being freaked out by the flying fairies she saw seconds ago.

“You’re scarier than those freakish pixie abominations!”

The dog’s name is Prince, but let’s see later on if it even matters that I mentioned him at all. She then meets the headmistress, who gives her a tour of the playset - I mean, the school. The amenities includes a “state-of-the-art digital classroom” (fancy way of saying, “computer room), an “Olympic-sized ballroom” (how big does a ballroom dancing floor need to be for the Olympics anyway?) and their “luxurious spa.” A little pink fairy suddenly flies at Blair’s ribcage and accidentally splots her with a cupcake she was carrying. This is “Grace,” (Oh, I get it! She’s clumsy but her name is “Grace.”) her “personal princess assistant. Every student at Princess Charm School has one. I guess they’re like the owl/toad/cat of Hogwarts, but able to speak and be annoying. It isn’t clear in the movie whether or not these fairies only exist in this school in the same magical way, or if maybe there are also fairies with other jobs in the outside world, but from the way Blair reacts to them, you just have to assume she’s seen them before the events of the movie. Why else would the first thing she says to this one be a line that deserves its own paragraph breaks:

Now if someone spills a pot roast on me, I’ll be a complete meal.

Mmmm. I should totally have pot roast and cupcake for dinner tonight. Grace shows her to her locker where she meets the Requisite Bitches of PCS, Portia and Delancy. Actually, let me take a moment to say that Portia is my favorite character of the whole thing. She’s the “dumb” one, but instead of it being played as an airheaded or ditsy way, she’s more like what Steven Wright’s hypothetical kinda slow but upper-class teenage daughter would be like. It’s hard to describe through text, but her line reads sound bored enough to the point where it’s funny, though maybe ironically so. Look for a list of her best lines later on in the review!
Delancy confronts Blair in standard Mean Girl style by telling her the lottery is a joke and commoners don’t belong and meanwhile Portia minds her own business eating the cupcake she found on the floor. Delancy calls forth her Personal Assistant, Wickellia (I like to think that the name is, rather that being a not-so-subtle clue to wickedness, actually an allusion to the assistant’s fondness for candles, which is not canonical at all) for the sake of showing the audience that she likes to yell at her PPA.
Blair’s PPA then shows her that her locker, in addition to holding charm school essentials like a jewel-encrusted hairbrush and diamond lipstick (I’ve gotta wonder how much money this organization donates to needy charities), also has a magical curtain that can instantaneously transform the princess-to-be from her waitress clothes (and hair bun) to her school uniform (with hair now down with a little ponytail, which makes me also wonder why any hairbrush, jewel-encrusted or not, is necessary anymore)! Also just like The Sims!

This is the impromptu pose she strikes immediately after emerging from her transformation. Are you clumsy, unsure and unready or are you a world-class diva? Choose one only!

She’s led to her room and roommates and - HEADS UP, INCOMING OUT-OF-CONTEXT SCREENSHOT!

Nope, not gonna explain it. Why not leave a comment if you think you can figure out what’s going on here?

Isla is a shy aspiring computer-based musician working on her “tunes” (Does any real person anywhere really call songs “tunes?” Especially teenage girls?) that she doesn’t want anyone to hear yet and Hadley is a complex and multi-layered character whose history is - no, I’m kidding, she likes soccer.

Next is the Starlight Welcome, a procession scene where we get to see Princesses and Lady-Royals-in-training receive their Training Tiaras. Dame Devin announces it’s her last year before her daughter takes over Gardania and things are revealed about The Legend of Queen Isabella. What do you mean, what lege - *sigh* Fine. Queen Isabella was Dame Devin’s sister-in-law, who died with the rest of her family in an accident. No brownie points rewarded for telling me why I’m mentioning this. It’s not exactly a cerebral mystery. Anyone who pays attention at all to the few seconds in which Blair’s roommates tell this to her really should figure out what’s going to happen in the end, adolescent girl or not. Blair herself is allowed to be oblivious to storytelling clichés, but only because she doesn’t realize she’s a character in a story. What may be slightly less obvious is the hint Isla gives about The Legend of Gardania’s Magical Crown. Possible TinTin crossover?

I’m guessing those books are never actually used for readin’.

In an afterward scene Delancy and her mother Dame Devin condescend Blair a lot, during which time Devin notices something familiar about Blair’s face and - oh, whatever, I’m not going to mention every “clue” and just tell you, yes, it turns out later that Blair is a descendant of Queen Isabella. Because she was adopted by her “mom.”

What game are these fairies playing? Please let me know in the comments section!

Delancy continues being a MEAN GIRL by having her royal assistant creature thing tie an end of the tablecloth to Blair’s dress while she isn’t looking, causing her to make a total mess of everything on the table when she stands up! And though it should be obvious it happened to her as the result of an intentional prank (everyone can see the tablecloth still stuck to her), I guess it supposedly comes off as her being clumsy again. Why would Delancy need to make Blair look clumsy if she has already been doing a good enough job of that herself? Nnnnot sure.

Damn, Barbie! You’re dark.

Headmistress Privet has a talk with Blair about how Dame Devin recommended that Blair be expelled. Keep in mind that Blair hasn’t been done anything that can be seen as misbehaving. She’s just been clumsy a few times - accidentally bumping into people and toppling them over and such. So, man, to expel her just for that is pretty damn strict. It’s a good thing Urkel didn’t win the lottery invite - he would’ve been suspended as soon as he set foot in the place!

Welcome to the Fruit Loops wing of the library.

Privet explains to Blair what makes a princess (hint: it’s character with confidence). You would think that any one of her classes should be teaching her this, but they’re busier teaching balance and poise and stuff. So Privet offers to tutor Blair! Again, you would think that the whole idea of Blair talking her classes is to learn what she needs to learn, but... well anyway. This sets up a music montage that mostly shows us Blair learning about poise and balance. It might be fair to assume she’s also being taught elocution and actual knowledge of some sorts and but that wouldn’t come across in a music montage, would it?
Then we get a scene about the girls dancing with boys from … yes... PRINCE CHARMING ACADEMY. This raises many questions, not limited to “Do Prince Charming Academy students have their own fairy helpers too?” but I’ll let you contemplate your own. But you will be happy to know that one of the Potential Princes is the offspring of Greg Proops and Harold Ramis.

EWW! Delancy doesn’t want to dance with HIM! He has... *gag*...ILL-FITTING GLASSES!

Blair is left out because she’s the one extra girl, until one of the boys arrive late. This boy...er, man? Guy. Dude. He’s Nicholas. Blair takes a shine to him because he’s so...adequately friendly. They bond momentarily by pretending to be formal in a jocular manner! “As will I, good sir,” and all that. The two then for some unclear reason decide to bust out some hip-pop disco moves instead of formally ballroom dancing, which also for some unclear reason gets everyone else to bust each of their own respective moves. But no, no one reprimands any of them for this.

As Privet announces some junk about the students getting the chance to pamper themselves in the spa (cause, you know, all of the other time they spend in PCS is such laborious back-breaking work) before having a dinner in the palace, Dame Devin is seen whispering (presumably devilishly) to Wickellia. I guess princess assistant are obliged to help their princess’s mothers, too. Then while getting manicures from their princess assistants in the princess charm school spa baths

Hold on. I just need to take a moment to realize I just wrote that.

Ahem. Blair Isla and the other one again spontaneously decide to talk about the legend of Queen Isabella’s family. Geez, isn’t there a class there for coming up with new things to talk about? But when they get back to their room - GASP! Their uniforms have been shredded to pieces! And coronation day is only two days away! Well, surely all they have to do is use the already established magical powers of the locker Blair uses at the beginning to get a new uniform? Or does the locker not have the ability to create new fabric, and can only dress the student with what’s already in it? But no, no, that’s still unnecessary. Surely all they have to do is call or find the headmistress and explain what happened, so that new uniforms can be issued promptly, since I’m sure the school has extras anyway. But. No, wait, this isn’t even thought of as a possibility by any of them. Nope. Blair’s idea is to create NEW uniforms made entirely from the materials of their old uniforms. At least it’s not an excuse to give Barbie a new and sold separately fashion set that you can buy at a store near you. I mean, Blair. This technically flies by school rules and impresses all of their classmates!
After all classmates are given permission to roam the second floor of the castle, the trio come across a “picture of Blair” which is actually a picture of Queen Isabella and, yes, again, Isabella is her mom. But I mention it now because Delancy sneakily overhears them talking about and realizes the implications of the fate of the Gardania which also affects her own fate!
Cut to some dinner scene where Dame Devin proposes bulldozing the “poor sections” (and Blair lives there!) of Gardania and turning it into beautiful park areas. This is the point where Delancy starts to seem concerned. Blair’s not going without a fight, though. I don’t mean a physical fight, though, just a proving-the-heir-to-the-throne kind.
Fancy Drew and her Clue Crew prepare to search the castle for the crown, but before they even head out the door a fire alarm rings out. After all of the students file out,  the Mystery Trio is confronted by Dame Devin, who accuses them of stealing her jewelry! She looks to her daughter to back up the claim that they were seen in her office, but Delancy is hesitant...before lying that she did see them. Guess what happens when the girls’ room is searched? Go on, I’ll give you a moment.

In the very first place he looks, the chauffeur/security guard (presumably the only male faculty member of Princess Charm School) finds Devin’s necklace! I think this is more of a timesaver for the story rather than a clue that he might’ve been involved in the scheme. Brock (did I mention the guy’s name is Brock?) quickly finds more hidden around the room. Privet, satisfied with accepting Devin’s version of events as irrefutable fact, has Brock dismiss the “guilty” party. But as they’re lead down some corridor in some part of the building, Delancy stops Brock and orders him to turn them over to her. After all, it won’t be long until she’s officially in charge anyway! So now Delancy is on their side! She gives Blair a map leading to the vault of the basement, which holds the crown. One might also wonder why anyone hasn’t, say, talked to Privet (before the jewelry accusation) about this possibility that Blair might be the rightful heir and have her investigate the matter. Or why Delancy doesn’t fess up to Privet at this point. She explains that she would want Blair to be able to prove her possible ownership because she “wants what’s right,” but why couldn’t she see to “what’s right” through Privet instead of having Blair and her friends risk even more trouble? Come to think of it, why do Blair and her friends even trust Delancy at this point? They know that they weren’t in Devin’s office, so they know Delancy was lying about having seen them, and when she meets up with them here, she doesn’t even apologize for lying about it! How do they know she isn’t just trying to trap them in the basement or get them into even more trouble?
I have no answers to any of these questions. But despite these matters, a sneaking sequence gets underway. Remember Prince, the dog from the beginning of the movie/review of the movie? He has a function! He’s used to distract a security dude (okay, so I count two male faculty members) so that Blair, Hadley and Isla (I don’t expect you to remember, but those are the names of her two friends/roommates) can sneak outside into a window in the middle of the night.

In their defense, they don’t have any black, dark, or even non-bright-and-sparkly clothing available. That’s, like, for goths and stuff.

As your standard Mission-Impossible-theme-soundalike plays in the soundtrack, Blair, Isla, Hadley and Grace - yeah it turns out Blair’s personal princess assistant came along too...were Isla and Hadley’s assistants just not up for the adventure, I guess? Or just somewhere else on lookout maybe? I dunno. Anyway, they’re stopped in their tracks at the sight of a laser alarm in one of the rooms. Though the lasers themselves are invisible at first, Blair reveals where they are by, yes, using a cosmetics product! The very fact that they decided to bring along a compact case with powder in it on this little excursion without knowing there would be any laser alarms ahead of time is pretty hilarious to me.
So. Have you, the reader - thanks for reading this far, by the way, I admire your endurance - ever seen the movie “Jay and SIlent Bob Strike Back?” I refer to the scene in which three young women are in a long narrow vault with laser alarm beams separating them from prized jewels. They each take turns passing the spaced between the lasers by way of ridiculously elaborate gymnastics. While it is possible that the whoever created this scene in Barbie: Princess Charm School has never seen Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, it’s also quite possible that whoever created this scene expects that no one who will watch Barbie: Princess Charm School has ever seen Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, but I guess they didn’t count on me (or my fiancée Amanda). There’s also the possibility that this is meant as an intentional winking homage, but....nahhhh. But the two scenes aren’t exactly the same, either. Only Hadley does the gymnastics bit (she’s the sporty one, remember?) and the other two slowly crawl or limbo through. Also, none of the ladies fart in the Barbie version (as far as we know?).
Then we get That Scene in a Movie With Sneaking where the sneakers have to enter a password or code. So naturally, the password is something way too easy to guess and guessed way too quickly. Though they first try Delancy’s coronation date (which is of course “today” - which is, in case you’re wondering, June 10th), the system voice gives “Dame Devin” a hint to help “her” remember (after getting it wrong once!): “The day that it all fell into place.” Within the ten seconds until lockout (what a flaky system) the sleuths deduce that this refers to the day of the car crash (042619something) that killed Isabella. Tip to movie bad guys: If you must use a password or number based on something rather than a randomized set of character and numbers, come up with one based on something that no one else would know about you. I mean, I guess the password is obscure enough to deter anyone who might be interested in stealing the crown for the sake of stealing, but I figure she’s mostly keeping it hidden away so that no one (like, oh, some royal descendant she didn’t know about) wouldn’t have the chance to put the pieces together. And if this is the case, surely the password shouldn’t be a number directly related to the reason for keeping the crown hidden away! *sigh*
An hour through. Twenty minutes to go.

Caption: Guys, have I ever told you that I did a version of The Nutcracker once? It’s available wherever videos are sold.
Alternate Caption: Preeetty sure that’s not the Crown of Gardania. Keep looking.

Barely a second after they find The Crown in a case on the top of a shelf and bring it down, they’re caught red-handed by Devin, entering with Brock! Delancy obviously hadn’t counted on Brock being slightly suspicious as to why she would want to lead the other girls away even though she had no apparent reason to so him telling her mother about this suspicion.

Did that first freaky face I posted not scare you? How about this one?

Devin and Brock leave with the crown in its case just before locking Blair, Isla and Hadley in the vault. How long does Devin intend to keep them there? It’s...not clear. As she leaves them she laughs evilly and taunts, “Enjoy coronation day!” which suggests that she’s preventing them from attending the coronation, but since they’ve already been basically expelled, wouldn’t they have not been attending it anyway? And if she’s doing it to keep them from exposing the truth to someone else, then she’d have to keep them indefinitely, wouldn’t she? Or kill them later? She doesn’t seem that evil, really.
As if that isn’t a saddening enough thought, the next scene shows Blair’s mom and sister excitedly watching the opening of the princess coronation on TV back at the apartment. Even though in an earlier scene Blair is seen dejectedly waiting for her carriage ride home with her stuff in tow, she evidently didn’t take the time to call her family to tell them things didn’t work out.
Oh, and back to the vault. Since they’re not able to get cell-phone service “down here,” (exactly how far deep down is this basement?)  the only way to contact help is by opening a ventilation duct (a screwdriver was lying around somewhere in the vault? Or they thought of bringing one?) and having Grace fly through it and find Privet. But oh no! She can’t, because it turns out there are fans in this ventilation duct! Okay, I’ve gotta give credit to this movie for that touch of realism. Other movie characters aren’t often enough stopped in their tracks by moving fan blades. Also, whereas too often a fully grown adult is oddly able to access a large enough duct, at least this is one of the movies where a tiny character travels through a normal-sized one. Luckily, Grace proves she isn’t completely useless by accidentally stumbling upon … some sort of set of wires connected to the security system. I’m not an expert in this kind of stuff.
Back to the coronation! Just as it’s Delancy Devin’s turn to be crowned Princess of Gardania, she decides to stall. Presumably she does this so that Blair has a chance to dramatically interrupt the proceedings with the crown, but... if she’s this sure that Blair is the rightful princess, why doesn’t she, say, ditch the assembly altogether and check the basement herself to see if Blair found the crown? For that matter, why didn’t she just directly join Blair in her sneaky ninja mission in the first place? Is it because she wants Blair to make the big reveal in such a way that she can pretend she didn’t know anything about it? In any case her clever stalling technique is to inform everyone that before being crowned, the Proper Princess Protocol is for everyone to spin around seven times (in honor of the seven hills of Gardania!). So everyone does.
Back to the vault! Somehow... SOMEHOW. Blair’s phone is now linked up with the keypad. I’d like to know whether they’re really that technologically advanced (did they open the phone casing and solder wires ...somehow?) or if there was just a handy mini-USB cable connected to the system-wire-box, complete with downloadable driver and software updates. It does give me an idea for an actual Barbie doll I’d like to see: Hacker Barbie!
As we the technologically adequate audience suspend our disbelief quite a lot, they try the same code they used to get in to no avail. At least they checked to make sure Dame Devin isn’t idiotic enough to have not changed the code before leaving. How can they possibly unlock the door, then? Well, you see. As Devin was leaving, the girls heard her change the code from the bleeps the keypad made. And because of that, Isla had that same sequence of notes stuck in her head and has been absent-mindedly humming it. So, using her musical skills (she’s the one into music! This has been established, if you were paying attention.), Isla matches up the notes up the notes of the tune to the notes made by the number pad and “plays” the new unlock code. Note to security system manufacturers: Don’t implement sounds into your keypad designs!
Back to the ceremony! Things are getting intense, now! Delancy now has people hopping on one foot (“to honor those who have hopped before us”) and patting their heads while rubbing their stomachs and ... maybe she’s not really stalling at all and just wanted everyone to make fools of themselves anyway. There’s a possibility that makes sense. But Dame Devin soon enough tires of this nonsense and demands that her daughter be crowned! And...just as...the crown...is slowly....lifted to-wards-her...heeeeaaadd...

WAIT! Blair interrupts, making a claim to the throne, as Princess Sophia, daughter to Isabella. Devin still insists on crowning Delancy before anything can change, because I suppose a lady is crowned, it’s permanently official, no take-backs! Any sense of suspense that can be taken from this scene hinges on that very idea. The movie seems to suggest that if Delancy has that crown on her head for even a moment, there’s no way that rulership can be transfered to Blair afterward at any point, proof of true regality or not! There’s a short kerfuffle with a flying fairy and the crown exchanging hands and a rug being flipped and Prince the dog helping slightly but in the end, when Delancy  gets ahold of it, she does the right thing by handing it to Blair. So now, how exactly does her having possession of the crown prove that she is its rightful owner? Come on, you can’t be that daft. Obviously, when she places the crown on her own crown, magic sparkles surround her as she twirls and her school uniform is transformed into a beautiful princess dress. I can’t believe you didn’t figure that out on your own.
Dame Devin, as you should also be able to guess, is now so furious that she yells angrily at the Younger Devin, accidentally blurting that she “eliminated” Isabella so that Delancy could be princess one day. But oops, she’s on TV and everything! As she’s dragged away by guards, she really does say “You’ll pay for this!” and somewhere Captain Planet’s ears are burning. In case you’re wondering, even though you’re not, I don’t know whether or not Wickellia has to pay in any way for being an accessory to evilness.
Now the big, really big moment. What does Blair have to say now that she’s an official Princess Charm School Princess? Some short speech about how every girl has princess potential. Then she chooses her lady royal (I forget what a lady royal is or does or if the idea was ever mentioned here): Delancy! But why, even she she was mean to her? Because she “wouldn’t be wearing this crown without your help.” Well, that’s as well and nice and I’m sure it makes Delancy feel great and forgiven, but what about Grace, Isla and Hadley? Why don’t they even get the consideration? The camera doesn’t cut to them at this point so we don’t know whether they make bitter offended faces at this news.
The movie ends with a dance scene. Everyone dances (except Dame Devin, let’s imagine she’s being incarcerated during this scene) to a track Isla made herself! Because anyone watching this was wondering throughout the whole hour or so, “But what about Isla? Will she ever become confident enough to let other people hear the music she’s working on?” Worry no more. Blair meets back up again with Prince Nicholas and they...dance together again. Well, given that he is the only boy that she apparently has talked to during her whole stay, I’m sure they will get married and live happily ever after. But what about Blair’s mom and sister, you interject! They now arrive too! At...the same after-coronation dance. Even though they were just watching it the coronation at their apartment. How close exactly is the school to their home? Given it’s a few minutes’ carriage ride, at least it won’t take them long to move their belongings, because Blair gives them the news that they will now be living in the palace!

Make up your own caption for this one. Please.

Now, let’s see. I think the only loose end that needs to be wrapped up is the matter of Blair’s mom’s vague illness. What will become of that? Will being royalty automatically give her access set her for life in terms of the medical care she needs? Why didn’t the family have enough money to help her if Blair could afford to own her own freakin’ coffee shop? What if it was an illness that medicine can’t cure yet? Now that they’ve discovered magic exists (unless they knew before?), will it turn out that magic can, in addition to making you and your flying fairies look fabulous, also cure life-threatening physical maladies? Does the outside-of-the-castle world know about this?
You’ll just to go without knowing any of that, because the movie just ends with some more music and dancing. Just...assume things turn out okay for her, allright?

Take the time to carefully read through this list of voice actors and tell me: Which surname would you least like to have?

The credits replay the same song from the opening and it occurs to me that it was a lie. She did need a crown! You couldn’t definitively tell she was a princess without it. And I doubt that she’ll even turn the world around all that much. She might turn Gardania slightly, but given that it’s established there are several princesses of the world (an earlier scene revealed a Princess of Philadelphia, no I’m not kidding), I doubt she alone will have that much of an impact. But who knows - maybe there’ll be a sequel? Let’s hope not.



CONCLUSION
aka the short bit for those who didn’t want to read those several pages worth of text

Like your typical Barbie movie, it is dumb and sloppily written. It would be hard for any adult, childless or not, to genuinely enjoy it, unless for riffing such as this. Even then, it can get exasperating. But would kids like it? Boys: No, not at all. Don’t bother. Girls? It’s...possible, but probably mostly for its shiny pretty colors. But I haven’t asked any girl children for their opinion so I can’t say for certain.

Since this film revolves around a school, I thought it’d be appropriate to give it a letter grade for my review:


C-


 As bad as I made it out to me - and yes, it is bad, but it doesn’t deserve a failing grade. I wouldn’t be so unforgiving as to fail it just because it happens to be very clumsy. After all, it is fair to judge it as what is it, an innocently harmless time-passer for female kids that’s about as enjoyable as you expect it to be. And considering what they were given to work with, the animators and designers did what I would call a passable job. Also, Portia was great. I’d like to see her in her own Sharpay’s Fabulous Adventure-esque spin-off feature! No, before you ask, I do not intend to ever review or even watch Sharpay’s Fabulous Adventure.

But, Kevin! If even this vapid nonsensical mess gets a passing grade, how truly awful would a movie have to be for you to give it less than an F?


You’ll have to wait for my next review.




 
Until then, here’s this:


 REVIEW “BONUS” MATERIAL


BLAIR QUOTABLES
“I don’t fit in her at all! I’m like a burp in a symphony.” (funny in how unfunny it is)
“No one can make you feel inferior. Not without your consent.” (unintentionally funny)

PORTIA QUOTABLES (especially delightful out of context!)
-”Look, Delancy. They’re serving floor cakes.”
-”Is it naptime? How come nobody told me?”
-”Yodeling hand puppets?”
-”I didn’t know people made clothes. I thought they came from elves. You know, like toast.”