Wild Child

Aug 17 2008 Sunday Sun

DROP the square peg of a fashion-obsessed US teen girl into the round hole of a stuffy English boarding school and you have the classic ingredients for a culture clash comedy.

At first, the new girl rails against centuries of tradition but, of course, she soon learns to look beyond the uptight rules and stiff upper lip attitudes to find camaraderie where she least expects it.

Screenwriter Lucy Dahl sketches characters in broad strokes, consigning realism to detention for the sake of giggles or tension.

The film pays a cursory glance to themes of grief and bullying, but not to the extent that occasional tears dampen the underlying mood of optimism.

Meanwhile, the first seeds of romance give bloom to a pleasantly chaste relationship between the heroine and her suitor, who has clearly been dipping into his mother’s Mills & Boon when he gushes: “Every day I’m with you, I keep catching my breath.”

Either that or her perfume is provoking an asthma attack.

Teenage tearaway Poppy has never come to terms with the death of her mother, wrecking all of her father’s subsequent relationships. So, after her latest dramatic outburst, widower father Gerry dispatches Poppy to England to the boarding school run by imperious Mrs Kingsley.

The 16-year-old American immediately clashes with head girl Harriet, and with her dorm mates Kate, Kiki, Josie and Drippy.

The quartet gradually warm to Poppy, encouraging the newcomer to fit in, but without sacrificing her lust for life. In the process, Poppy catches the eye of Mrs Kingsley’s handsome son Freddie, whom Harriet has been pursuing for months.

Wild Child is a modern day fairytale that doesn’t stray from the path of predictability, signposting every narrative twist, such as when someone warns Poppy to log off her computer session in case another pupil uses the account to send malicious emails.

No prizes for guessing what happens when she forgets.

Roberts’ character is incredibly unsympathetic for the film’s first half but wins us over as she transforms from Malibu Barbie into team player, on and off the lacrosse pitch.

Pettyfer is little more than eye candy, while Nick Frost scene-steals as the sleepy town’s outrageously camp hairdresser, who responds to Poppy’s moaning by musing: “I need a back wax and a night with Michael Buble, but we don’t always get what we want.”

3 Popcorns

DIRECTOR: Nick Moore. CAST: Emma Roberts, Kimberley Nixon,Sophie Wu, Linzey Cocker, Juno Temple, Alex Pettyfer, Natasha

Richardson, Georgia King, Ruby Thomas. RUNNING TIME: 98mins. RATING: 12A.