BRATZ THE MOVIE-JANUARY OF SUCK 3

This deserves to be on so many worst movie lists.

It's weird, it truly is, I remember this coming out, I remember this being trashed, yet no one ever thought to warn me that this is one of the worst movies ever made. It's baffling, insulting, mildly racist and incredibly superficial, but above all else these girls don't even live up to the title, Bratz The Movie is in fact not about bratty girls, which is odd. I don't really remember much about the Bratz line of toys, largely because my sisters were never into them (are they still a thing? I'm not sure I've even seen one recently) but from what I did gather is that they were like Barbie, but with attitude. Among the film's many flaws, I feel like this is one of the worst, sure the girls acting like brats wouldn't solve a thing, but realistically why aren't they? The film's popular girl villain is much more like a brat, so this adaptation of Bratz toys is about kind girls banding together to stop a brat, lack of originality aside, wouldn't the proper adaptation be about four bratty girls pranking, misbehaving, acting spoiled and much more? Like the villains would instead be the teachers, parents and "goody two-shoes" characters trying to ruin the fun. Instead we get a movie about independence, individuality and the tearing down of societal expectations in high school, that the film predictably ends up screwing up in the process by reinforcing the messages it's supposedly against. Again it's weird.

While I'm sure many people are bound to express positivity for the girls being a diverse group, let me just say this, don't clap until you see the treatment of the girls. Admittedly nothing in the film (at least from what I remember) is outright racist, but it can't be denied that some of it is a little uncomfortable and stereotypical, for example the Latina of the group likes singing, which is illustrated at multiple points with an embarrassing clip of her singing, you guessed it, "La Cucaracha". There's little things like that throughout the film, we get a dose of "Spanglish" whenever our Latina brat talks to her mother, but trust me, it's not natural, it just sounds like the director said "please sprinkle as much Spanish there so the audience knows your race", which was both annoying and as I said before, uncomfortable. Then there's the Asian brat, who is of course the geek of the group; don't get me wrong intelligence is a positive trait, but when that becomes a key part of the character's identity, especially one whose race is often stereotyped as being smart, yes it is kind of an issue, no matter how positive the stereotype is. I don't really remember much about the black brat, which I'm not sure if that's a result of me checking out or just how little her presence is even emphasized, but I do know that the white brat is the one who gets the scholarship by the end, I'm sure it's explained why she's the only one, but honestly out of boredom, I started to believe it was the film's unintended racist message that the white person deserves to go to college while the others do all the hard work... yes this is partially a joke, but come on, this movie sucks even if that assumption is false.

Look, my advice is avoid this superficial film, it's boring, too damn long and a collection of the worst tropes in teen movies. It tries to have fun with itself, turning cliques into cartoonish groups, the villain has a second sweet sixteen, while the film's rapist/stalker like character is a kid (very creepy) but it all just makes this even more annoying and insulting to watch. A lot of people seem to ignore this movie, but I'd argue it's one of the absolute worst things put to film.

P.S. I remember there was some surprise over Jon Voight in this, but honestly, looking at his career these days it fits right in with his work.

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Written by Octaviano Macias