Grease is not the word! (High School Musical (Encore Edition, DVD))

Member Name: kellylouj

Product:	High School Musical (Encore Edition, DVD)
Date:	01/11/08 (152 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Disney Movie

Disadvantages: Poor acting, songs and storyline

Being a 26 year old woman I was suprised to find myself taking this DVD home from a colleague at work but as a huge Disney Fan it only seemed fair that I watch it and see what all the hype is about.

When I was visiting Disneyland Paris last November there was a lot of hype around the park relating to High School Musical or HSM for short.

*~*Storyline*~*

Troy Bolton played by Zac Efron meets Gabriella Montez played by Vanessa Hudgens when they are thrown onto a stage at a New Year's Eve party in a ski lodge and they are forced to karaoke together. Both characters appear to be taken with each other and exchange numbers promising to contact each other.
Shortly after Gabriella's mother is transferred and by pure coincidence this just happens to be the High School that Troy Bolton attends.

Both realise that they have potential when it comes to singing and when audtions come up Troy misses them to see Gabriella audition but she is too nervous to come forward and its only at the very end that they both come forward to audition together and end up with a call back for the school musical.

Gabriella is intelligent and into her studies whereas Troy is the most fanciable male in the high school and very popular when it comes to sports and even misses basketball practice. Although they are so different it is apparant from the beginning of the film that opposites are very much likely to attract.

Sharpay played by Ashley Tisdale doesn't like Gabriella and this is immediately apparant when both Gabriella and Troy are called back for an audtion to compete against her and her partner Ryan played by Lucas Grabeel and spend the majority of the film tryng to ruin Gabriella and Troy's chances of leading the musical.

Not only does Gabriella and Troy have to content with Sharpay and Ryan's bitterness but Gabriella's best friend Taylor played by Monique Coleman and Troy's best friend Chad Danforth played by CobinBleu devise a plan to get things back to normal and ensure that Troy keeps his priorites as they should be with the basketball team.

A trick is put in place to ensure that they both see each other from a different perspective and Gabriella decides to forget about the audition and focus her attentions on the Scholastic Decathalon.
Gabriella is hurt and confused and this is when the story begins to unravel and the film begins with the storyline.

*~*My Opinion*~*

The fact that my husband was refusing to watch this movie should have given me some warning that this was not a Disney movie that shoud be added to our collection.
From the moment Troy and Gabriella began to sing I should have turned the DVD off but I didn't I had to know what the storyline would be in this story as well as get my head around the fact that the characters were old before their time what with the actors themselves being closer to the ages of 20 rather than high school age but once I got over this and the short songs that they sang I started to focused on the characters performance.

The acting is traditional of american characters woody, emotionless and dull.
The characters are so predictable and so difficult to relate to, maybe this is an age issue for me as I am the closer end to 30 but I just could not get into this film despite me really wanting to enjoy it.

Whilst I had been in Disney in 2007 I had been addicted to Hannah Montana and Its so Raven purely because the Disney Channel and BBC News is all you can obtain in the english language and the catchy songs and clips for this film really made me want to see it.

Saying that when I was younger I had a penpal in America and I always envisaged their high school life to be so different to mine in the UK and that all American High Schools are like this.
Many people have compared this to Grease and being totally honest there really is no comparison, this film is no where near as realistic as other films such as Fame or Grease and the songs are nowhere near as memorable as those featured in the hit movies.

The teenage hearthrob storyline is ideal for younger children and its not hard to go back a few decades in my case and see the film for what it is a children's movie that they will love, the singing and the characters are easy enough to follow and is our children's version of a musical film that maybe we would have enjoyed at that age.

My niece is not yet into this being only 5 years old but my cousin's daughter who is 7 loves this film so much and is always singing the music and has all of the merchandise so Disney are definately cashing in on there latest movie release.

Summary: A film you can really only get away with watching with someone under 16 years old!