Hating Alison Ashley
Director: Geoff Bennett
Stars: Saskia Burmeister, Delta Goodrem, Craig McLachlan, Jean Kitson, Tracey Mann.
reviewed by GREG KING
At the centre of this story of teenage angst and growing pains is the rivalry between teacher's pet Erica Yuken (relative newcomer Saskia Burmeister) and Alison Ashley (Delta Goodrem), the new girl in school who seems set to usurp Erica's place in the pecking order. Erica is something of a loner and a misfit, who grows more suspicious of the seemingly perfect Alison, and is intent on undermining her at every turn. Events come to a head during the school camp at the aptly named Camp Desolation, where Erica expects to be the star of the traditional final night performance.
The passage of rites for troubled teenage girls has been explored previously in films like the superb Looking For Alibrandi, Only The Brave, and the recent American independent film Thirteen, which brought a grungy edge to some familiar themes. Hating Alison Ashley, based on the popular novel by Robin Klein, explores similar themes from a more comic perspective. Hating Alison Ashley is teen friendly fare that will mainly appeal to audiences who love the sort of lightweight fluff regularly churned out by Hollywood - usually starring Hilary Duff or Lindsay Lohan (eg: Confessions Of A Teenage Drama Queen, etc) - where the misfit heroine learns to come to terms with who she is and who her friends are in the often cruel social cliques of high school.
Director Geoff Bennett manages to maintain a good balance between comic moments and the more emotional moments and the film contains a few pleasant surprises. However, all of the young cast seem far too old to be convincing as fourteen year olds. Despite her previous experience in front of the camera in neighbours, Goodrem seems uncomfortable here and delivers a one-dimensional performance. Craig McLachlan hams it up wonderfully as the clumsy and vain PE teacher, while Jean Kitson is superb as the brassy teacher Miss Belmont, whose role has been beefed up from the original novel. But it is Burmeister, in her first leading role, who delivers a solid and mature performance that carries the film over its bumpy patches.
While it has some moments that work a treat, Hating Alison Ashley ultimately fails to completely satisfy. Given that the book is a staple of school curriculums, one would have expected more effort to have gone into producing a polished and insightful film of the same standard as Looking For Alibrandi.
**1/2
Reviewed by PETER KRAUSZ.
Pitching films at a teenage audience is often fraught with problems, with many filmmakers not able to cross-over to an adult market. Looking for Alibrandi (00) is a rare example of a film that worked well for a female teenage audience and had some cultural and familial resonances for a wider audience as well. Robin Klein's novel, read in many schools across the country, speaks to a female teenage demographic about growing up, friendship, being different, family life, and taking risks. Christine Madafferi adapted Klein's novel and the film was directed by Geoff Bennett (who has mostly worked in television).
On the whole, the film works quite well, focusing on Saskia Burmeister as the teenage girl at odds with the world, and a girl who becomes both her best friend and her nemesis from a well-to-do family, played by Delta Goodrem (who is too old for the role, but has a reasonable screen presence). The most amusing part of the film is the way teachers are represented: Jean Kittson is hilarious as the no-nonsense yet sympathetic teacher, while Craig McLachlen does pratfalls galore as an ineffectual Physical Education teacher. Tracey Mann does well as Aliosn's mother, and other characters are introduced that further the story in an entertaining way, including a love interest for Saskia, plus Mann's new boyfriend who turns out to be an unstereotypical truck driver.
For the most part this is a well-made, if slightly pedestrian film, with a jaunty music score from Cezary Skubiszewski. The film should succeed with its target demographic, but could have been a bit more challenging to rein in a broader audience. Nevertheless, a good attempt at a well known story.
Score: 6/10
Reviewed by PETER MALONE
What if your name were Erica Yurken? What if you had ambitions to be a famous actress? What if you could not stand your family, your older sister who is always out on dates and a younger sister who for years has thought she was a horse? What if you couldn’t stand your mum’s truckie boyfriend and, though you loved your mum, she still acted as if she was in Kath And Kim? These are the yearnings and dilemmas of Erica Yurken whom nobody at school really likes. She is very well played by Saskia Burmeister.
Then, one day, a new girl comes into the class and sits next to her. It is singer Poor Erica lives a tormented life. She is good at her work but not appreciated. She volunteers to write the school play and be the star but she freezes and really can’t act. Who will replace her? Alison Ashley, of course. Erica is mean, devious, destructive, then tries her best to imitate a teacher on the phone to make sure Alison’s mother comes to the play. She is unmasked, rebuked – and is forbidden to attend the performance. But, of course, she has it all wrong.
Alison is a poor little rich girl, neglected by her mother and gets on well with Erica’s family. She does make a booboo in neglecting Erica and going off with her fashionable friends. But, she is sorry. And she does her best with the play. Erica has to get over hating the very nice Alison Ashley.
She is supported unreservedly by Mum ( This is not a film designed for a male sensibility. It should reach its targeted female audience, especially those girls who feel like Erica inside.