From Justin to Kelly (2003) - DVD Review

Film:
DVD:

Written by: Kim Fuller
Directed by: Robert Iscove
Starring: Kelly Clarkson, Justin Guarini, and a bunch of people who you've never heard of before

Features:

• Extended version of the movie with two new dance numbers

• Running audio commentary by actors Clarkson & Guarini and director Iscove
• Behind-the-scenes Featurettes
• Video Scrapbook
• Deleted Scenes
• Gag Reel

Released by: 20th Century Fox
Region: 1
Rating: G
Anamorphic: Yes.

My Advice: Avoid it like the Black Plague.

Kelly (Clarkson) is caught in a rut. She is just singing her heart out to a bunch of rednecks night after night, so her friends decide that it's time for them all to get away to the beach for a vacation. So, they head down to Miami, where Kelly instantly hooks eyes with Justin (Guarini) who is down with some of his friends to do the same thing. The problem is that Kelly's friend Alexa (Katherine Bailess) also has her sights on bagging Justin for her own and she will risk her friendship with Kelly to make her dreams come true with him.

Sound familiar? It should. It's every teeny-bopper movie that has come out since Beach Blanket Bingo. There's only one difference with this one; the stars of this movie exploited and subjected themselves to national scrutiny and potential embarrassment before they could land their roles. Therefore, no real acting talent is required. When you understand this one little bit of information, you can have all the joy you want to poking fun at this movie. Kelly and Justin are absolutely mired in mud on this one. They have no sense of character development since most of the dialogue is only present to provide a way to get from big, unrealistic dance number to big, unrealistic
dance number. The rest of the cast don't seem to get the fact that they are only there to make Justin and Kelly look good; they actually seem to approach this film as though it's their big break. Poor fools.

As a bonus, the DVD case taunts that it contains the "Never-before-seen Extended Movie Version with 2 New Dance Numbers!" I would have thought that all of this movie would have been "never-before-seen," considering how long it spent in cinemas. Anyway, at least there are some features, right? Ahem. There is a commentary track with Clarkson, Guarini and director Robert Iscove, but there is absolutely nothing worthwhile discussed here. All Justin and Kelly can talk about are the little cutsie things that happened on the set during almost every scene and Iscove actually tries to apply some kind of artistic merit to the movie a couple of times. Again, poor fool. There's probably a good drinking game to be found on this commentary track with the number of "cute" things that Justin and Kelly come up with.

The Behind-the-scenes featurettes are just a joke. Neither of them goes into any detail about how this project came about or anything (although, if my theory is correct, this movie was really written at the same time that American Idol was conceived so all they had to do was plug in the names of the winners and start shooting).

The video scrapbook is nothing more than a complete waste of time. It is a loosely thrown together montage of interviews with Justin and Kelly which amounts to a love-fest, wherein they attempt to inflate the egos of everyone involved in the project. There are three deleted scenes on the disc, but they reinforce the fact that the entire movie should have gone in to this section of the DVD. And there's the Gag Reel, of which I am normally a huge fan, but it's nothing more than shots of the cast (mostly Justin and Kelly) flubbing up their lines...and its not funny at all. Wow, when you look at it, there's really more stuff on the DVD than there really should be for a movie that is this bad.

My assessment is that this movie should be considered as toxic to the human body as second-hand cigarette smoke is. It should be avoided at all costs and you should litigate against anyone who tries to make you watch it.

• Click here to buy it from Amazon.
• Click here to buy Kelly Clarkson stuff from Amazon.
• Click here to buy American Idol stuff from Amazon.