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The To Do List
| Released |
4 October 2013 |
| Director |
Maggie Carey |
Starring
|
Alia Shawkat, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Aubrey Plaza, Rachel Bilson, Clark Gregg, Connie Britton, Andy Samberg, Bill Hader, Donald Glover |
| Writer(s) |
Maggie Carey |
Producer(s)
|
Mark Gordon, Tom Lassally, Brian Robbins, Sharla Sumpter, Jennifer Todd, Greg Walter |
| Origin |
United States |
| Running Time |
104 minutes |
| Genre |
Comedy |
| Rating |
16 |
|
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Tick!
As a big Parks and Recreation fan, it’s interesting to see the choices that Aubrey Plaza has made in her inevitable journey from small screen to big. It is the way of things now that once success is achieved as a regular character on a ratings winner TV show, the fledgling star must try to fly in the big bad world of movies. Would she go the quirky offbeat route? Yes – Safety Not Guaranteed, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World. Or would she go for the more mainstream summer movie teen market? Yes – The To Do List. Seems Plaza wants it all. It may seem like an odd choice for an actress so clearly indie not mainstream but, even in this film she brings her own innate offbeat quality to a familiar role. In what is essentially a female version of the ‘summer-before-college-losing it’ film, Plaza imbues the lead character with a charm that is not always present in the male counterparts of these films.
The film is set in 1993 – (there must be a script writing manual out there somewhere that’s telling writers to set their films in the recent past, everyone seems to be at it lately, cynically trying to capture the oldie nostalgic market as well as the teens no doubt, those dastardly marketing types) - and follows the exploits of class nerd Brandy Klark as she embarks on a summer of sexual discovery; by means of ticking items off her ‘list’. It’s all very familiar stuff here; the nerd who is desperate to ‘lose it’ before college, the bungling friends, the hot guy/girl they are fixated on and the series of increasingly ridiculous capers they get themselves embroiled in – usually at some sort of house party or other. If they hadn’t of called this film The To Do List, they might have marketed it as a prequel to Superbad: Superbras possibly? Anyone?
So…the notable difference here is that the central character is female. The To Do List is no doubt one of a raft of projects that were launched on our fair cinema shores after the game-changer hit of 2011; Bridesmaids. The race to cash in on this new market has been fierce and The To Do List does not disgrace itself. In an industry that takes a thing that works, reduces it to a formula and then keeps repeating it until all life has been drained away, The To Do List still somehow comes out of it okay. No, it’s doesn’t have the one liners that comes with having SNL writers and actors on the job, but it does have some pretty funny bits and the cast, especially Plaza are great and do the most with the material they’ve got. The To Do List isn’t breaking any moulds or box office records, but of its genre, it will slot nicely into the ‘I’ve seen this three times and I’m not sure how’ category and snuggle up nicely alongside recent offerings such as Superbad and American Pie.
- Bridget Deevy |
