By Skylla Mumana | Reporter
He’s All That is an American teen romantic comedy starring actor Tanner Buchanan and social media phenom Addison Rae Sterling, more popularly known as Addison Rae. The movie is a gender-swapped remake of the 1999 film “She’s All That,” which starred actors Rachel Leigh Cook and Freddie Prinze Jr., among other well known names in the industry.
After a whirlwind first week back at Baylor, I needed a little downtime and I figured that the best way to decompress was with a movie. While scouring through Netflix, I realized that plastered all over my homepage was the new movie “He’s All That.” The film had promotions on numerous social media pages and there was a lot of buzz surrounding it already, so I decided on that.
“She’s All That” tells the story of popular high school jock Zach Siler who makes a bet that he can turn any unattractive outcast into the next prom queen within six short weeks, leading him to encounter Laney Boggs, the broody, artistic, social pariah of his school. The movie itself reached No. 1 in the box office during its first week of release and garnered over $103 million dollars worldwide. The movie also helped to pave the way for numerous well-known actors to further their careers, such as Paul Walker, Gabrielle Union and Rachel Leigh Cook, the female lead.
As someone who grew up watching nineties movies as a child, I was no stranger to the original film plot. When I first saw it I did think that it was a bit cheesy, however, I came to love all aspects of it from the style choices, to the soundtrack and to its overall acting.
With that said, it was safe to say that I was hesitant when I started the reboot. As an avid book reader and movie-goer, I’ve never been a fan of remakes or reboots in general, because, as many can agree, they do not usually live up to their original counterparts. However, after watching the film, I feel that while the movie did not live up to the works of the original, it was very entertaining.
The plot of “He’s All That” is very similar to its original, and also had a star studded cast made up of actors as well as social media influencers, such as Kourtney Kardashian or Rae herself who has amassed 83.4 million followers on TikTok and 39.3 million on Instagram. The reboot premiered Friday on Netflix and follows makeover maestro and influencer Padgett Sawyer who makes a bet with her friend to transform an unpopular classmate into the next prom king.
Throughout certain points during the film I noticed the similarities between the two films, such as the character dynamics, music and particular phrasing (though I won’t go into detail so as to not spoil it for those who have yet to see it). Some major differences I noted were the use of social media, obviously, the levels of acting experience among the cast, the LGBTQ+ representation and how Buchanan’s character has an added quirk or interest that catches Rae’s character’s eye.
Overall, I would not call this movie record breaking nor were the performances Oscar worthy, however, it was fun to watch and even more fun to cringe at if you get embarrassed easily by movie tropes. If you are looking for a fun film to pass the time and dine to, then give this a try.
