A sickening sweet pile of pap . (High School Musical (Encore Edition, DVD))

Member Name: thehonesttruth

Product:	High School Musical (Encore Edition, DVD)
Date:	14/11/09 (23 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: -

Disadvantages: -

As any parent with young children will know, sometimes you are forced to watch films that hold absolutely no appeal to you simply to appease your offspring and stop the constant moaning of 'Im Booooooored'.High School Musical was one such film for me - I had no desire at all to watch this, but eventually caved to my daughters begging and decided to watch this with her

Pretty obviously, this film is a musical, set in, of all places, a high school . It's all there in the title, which is pretty uninspired - we can only assume the producers couldn't think of a better name . It centres on Gabriella, a bright but beautiful student, and Troy, who meet on holiday on new years eve and are forced into singing a karaoke duet. Surprise surprise, they can both sing wonderfully, and sparks fly,leading them to exchange numbers ,but as the clock strikes midnight Gabriella does a cinderalle act and vanishes to wish her mum a happy new year . Troy's gutted to have missed his chance with her, but lucks on his side as her mum gets relocated with work and on the first day of term, Gabriella turns up in his class!

There is a school musical coming up, and neither of them is initially keen to sign up - Gabriella has enough to do with fitting into a new school and trying to keep her big brain hidden, and Troy is too much of a wimp to do anything that might provoke teasing from his clichéd group of basketball team-mates. However, they both end up with starring roles, which causes controversy amongst their classmates and problems with their busy schedules .

Will these two be able to pull of their dream of being on stage with each other and snogging each others faces off .

Come on, its a Disney film. We all know there is going to be a happy ending, it's just never quite clear how they are going to get there - and there are a few subtle twists and turns in the plot that kept my daughter interested and guessing how things were going to turn out .

There were plenty of scmaltzy song and dance routines, with songs that were mostly bland and cheesy, but got annoyingly stuck in my head for days afterwards . The dance moves, I have to say I did find well choreographed, and the actors sang pretty well . They were, without fail, all stunningly gorgeous and perfectly groomed - not something I remember from my own secondary school days being surrounded by spotty teenage oik boys whose main obsessions were boobs and fiddling with their genitalia.

The films plot seems shamelessly filched from Grease - boy and girl meet and share a tender moment on holiday, are parted, and then luckily end up meeting again, only to be prevented from getting it together by their different social groups . The film even ends in more or less the same manner, with everyone suddenly best friends and loving each other .

I didn't enjoy this film - I found it sickly sweet, predictable, and far too 'teenage' for my tastes . My daughter loved it though, and that's what counts . Young girls will love this film, and the rest of us will just be forced to endure it .

3 stars - despite me personally hating it, it did what I wanted it to do and kept my daughter quiet for a bit, so I wouldn't feel justified in giving a really low rating . Although I did buy it on DVD for her, I'm leaving this as a film only review , as after enduring this pile of cringeworthy vomit-making sap, I certainly had no desire to torture myself any more by enduring the extra features .

Summary: -