Beth Webb - Events EditorWhether show choirs make you gleeful or glum, there has been a pandemic of them over the last three years that shows no signs of budging.
Whether show choirs
make you gleeful or glum, there has been a pandemic of them over the last three
years that shows no signs of budging. It’s inevitable then that the jazz
hands and matching outfits were due to spill onto the big screen. First to take
to the stage is Dawson Creek director Jason
Moore’s Pitch Perfect, proving that show tunes can get even a cynic’s feet
tapping.
Rebel Wilson’s
Fat Amy brings most of the laughs with her unkempt social graces and dead pan
one liners, with newcomer Hana Mae Lee
bringing the rest as a barely audible adorable psychopath. The rest of the
ensemble are debatable as memorable or even likable characters, Brittney Snow and Anna Camp proving two
dimensional and little more than a couple of hot targets for Kendrick to roll
her eyes at.
Anna Kendrick
settles into her first big commercial lead as the socially unsettled Beca, brought
resentfully to college on her father’s instruction. Her charm is undeniable,
highlighted best in her vocal audition armed with just an empty cup and a
Mainer’s Mountaineers’ song, and
had it not been Kendrick this character would have little going for her.
Sarcastic, rude and without much of a back story (divorced parents and a love
of David Guetta,) Beca is thrown onto campus as a defiant misfit, forced into
all-girl show choir The Bellas on the promise that there’s a DJ scholarship (or
whatever the alternative is) at the end of it for her.
As the competition begins to heat up our lyrical band of
outcasts chirp from caper to caper, falling out over creative differences,
partaking in numerous training montages, slowly falling for boys in a rival
choir (mainly the very sweet Skylar
Astin). Tempers spark, notes are hit, shapes thrown. This isn’t ground breaking stuff in
terms of narrative, imagine a frat pack film where everyone’s singing Bruno
Mars, and there’s echoes of last year’s big female-based comedy Bridesmaids,
with one particular vomit-anchored scene paying homage in its own disgusting
way.
Shave off about 20 minutes, flesh out some of the characters
and you’re close to a thoroughly likable, lasting, musical comedy. As it
stands, Pitch Perfect is very good fun, but still kicks out a few bum notes.
