Sugar & Spice (2001)

The last thing the movie world needs is another teenage comedy about conniving cheerleaders, but to be fair, this cheerfully vulgar entry in the teen sweepstakes hits the mark more often than not. Like most recent movies of its ilk, it owes nearly everything to Amy Heckerling's buoyant 1995 feature Clueless, right down to its specific female vernacular. Unlike that charming romantic confection, however, this film plays a bit darker. Sugar & Spice usually scores when it focuses on being a vicious satire of teen woes, and is less adept at creating a story and characters viewers should actually care much about. The spirited performers who populate the cast, however -- including Melissa George, Marla Sokoloff, and American Beauty ingénue Mena Suvari -- keep the proceedings engaging. Once intended as a unflinching black comedy (and originally called Sugar & Spice & Semiautomatics), the material was cleaned up by the filmmakers after the tragic Columbine shooting in Colorado in 1999. The result is wildly uneven and sometimes incoherent, but when the movie has its head on straight, the zingers fall right into place. ~ Jason Clark, All Movie Guide