Bring It On (2000): The decade kicked off with a spin on the bitchy-cheerleader cliche in teen movies by presenting us with cheerleaders as both heroines and villains in the ridiculously silly Bring It On. Not only did the film poke fun at the world of competitive cheerleading, but it also presented cheerleaders, perhaps for the first time in the teen movie world, as legitimate athletes with serious skills.
Important Life Lesson To Remember: "This is not a democracy, it's a cheerocracy."



Save The Last Dance (2001): I'm using Save The Last Dance to represent every dance-will-save-you movie of the decade, a theme that seemed to run through the past 10 years the way extreme makeovers dominated the teen movies of the 90s. If you could dance in a teen film of the 00s, you could pretty much do anything. As long as you wore a "slammin'" outfit, of course.
Important Life Lesson To Remember: That outfit you're wearing from the Gap is "country, and you look country in it."



Saved, 2004: The dark comedy tale of an uber-religious teenager who becomes pregnant centers not only on the issues surrounding teen pregnancy, but on religion (and the hypocrisy within), abortion, sexuality, disability, love, and the difficulties of finding yourself in high school and breaking away from the worldview that is often imposed upon you by authority figures. It also taught us that it's a good idea to avoid crashing your van into Jesus.
Important Life Lesson To Remember: "So everything that doesn't fit into some stupid idea of what you think God wants you just try to hide or fix or get rid of? It's just all too much to live up to. No one fits in one hundred percent of the time. Not even you."



Mean Girls, 2004: The true heir to the great teen films of the 80s and 90s, Mean Girls stands out for its Tina Fey-penned script and stellar cast, including a top-of-her-game Lindsay Lohan and the always-excellent Rachel McAdams. And while the film is often name-checked and referenced due to its catchphrases, the true importance of the film lies in the exploration of bullying amongst girls in high school, a very real and difficult issue that still needs addressing. The film is already dated in the world of social networking (can you imagine what Regina George would have done with sexting and Facebook?), but the overall message of the film still rings true: high school, and the girls in it, can be a real bitch.
Important Life Lesson To Remember: "Calling somebody else fat won't make you any skinnier. Calling someone stupid doesn't make you any smarter. And ruining Regina George's life definitely didn't make me any happier. All you can do in life is try to solve the problem in front of you."



Juno, 2007: Diablo Cody won an Oscar for her screenplay about a 16-year-old girl who discovers she's pregnant, briefly considers abortion, and eventually decides to carry the child to term in order to give it up for adoption. Focusing on Juno's quirks, fears, and frustrations while attempting to navigate both high school and pregnancy, the film attempts to create a character who is much more than an afterschool special cliche. Whether it succeeds or not depends on who you talk to—in our comments, anyway, the film is always fairly divisive. In any case, for all the pop culture posturing and quippy dialogue, there is something quietly honest about Juno; she is depicted in moments of absurdity, weakness, strength, sadness, and acceptance; all elements of growing up and trying to figure out how to make sense of the world when it doesn't seem to make any sense at all.
Important Life Lesson To Remember: "Look, in my opinion, the best thing you can do is find a person who loves you for exactly what you are. Good mood, bad mood, ugly, pretty, handsome, what have you, the right person is still going to think the sun shines out your ass. That's the kind of person that's worth sticking with."

Did I miss any? Feel free to leave your favorite moments from the past 10 years in teen movies in the comments.

Earlier: Important Life Lessons Learned From B-List Teen Movies Of The 90s

But it's not all pop cultural giggles. The blog also has an in-depth description of the two different kinds of abortion — surgical and medical, and links with information. What I like best about the blog though is that it is one of the few realistic portrayals of getting an abortion I've seen in any kind of media.

Movies that discuss abortion (Fast Times at Ridgemont High notwithstanding) have a completely hysterical view of it. It's either a non-option or the worst thing that ever happened to someone. My favorite passage of the blog is the one that decries this very thing:

I’m trying to get some advice and info that isn’t off a bulletin board style fact sheet. When I google “abortion blog” —because we all know blogs are a great repository for facts and rationality— i get these terrifying pro-life, abortion regret websites. One is called ” silent rain”. UGHHHHH. WHERE IS THE JUNO OF THE ABORTION WORLD?!? Precious, silver-tongued, knocked up 16 year olds where are you??

Well, this blogger seems to be a silver-tongued, knocked up, 23-year-old slinging facts and honesty and humor. It seems like a good start.

What To Expect When You're Aborting [myabortion.tumblr.com]

Look, I'll step up to the plate and admit that I was a stupid, reckless, hormone-addled teenage girl completely in love with my boyfriend with whom I thought I would live happily ever after. But we were also thoughtful and respectful of one another and made the decision to lose our virginities to one another in a clothed conversation before we bought condoms and proceeded with doing the deed. And then sometimes, one would break or we'd run out or we'd be somewhere and in the mood and we'd take the VERY BIG BAD risk of pulling out. And it was stupid, yes, but we thought we were invincible or I wasn't ovulating or whatever and all of that shit ended the very first time my period was late, believe you me. That was the longest week of my fucking life, mostly spent crying where my parents couldn't see because I saw two very distinct options: trying like hell to save up to get an abortion in time to actually have an abortion (not easy when you make $4.35 an hour at the mall and can't work more than 16 hours a week); or ruining my life. Yeah, I saw Murphy Brown and I knew about adoption but everyone's best student goodie-two-shoes little me could not get pregnant because I had plans and I was going to get out of Scotia and stop underlining everything.

And, really, I doubt seriously that most young women think too much differently about it, Juno or no Juno. Yeah, she has a happy ending and whatever (and, yes, I have a completely age-inappropriate crush on Michael Cera), but watching a damn fictional move or television show isn't going to make a teenage girl with aspirations of being more than the check-out girl at the local grocery store go out and attempt to get knocked up.

But that's the crux of the issue, isn't it? Even the girls interviewed about the supposed pregnancy pact and every girl ever interviewed about (purposeful) teen pregnancy ever identified the cause — most girls that seek out pre-graduation pregnancies really don't have great aspirations. They don't think college is in the cards, or don't want to go. They aren't looking beyond next year or the year after because they're not expecting much out of their lives. And so, sure, maybe Jamie Lynn Spears saying that being a mom is totes awesome rings a bell with them because being a mom is the only way they are really expecting to make a difference in the world.

Planned Parenthood notes that 73% of teen pregnancies occur among teenagers in families living below or just above the poverty line, even though less than 40% of all teenage girls fall into those income groups. Young women in those income groups are less likely to use contraception the first time than other women, less likely to use it on an ongoing basis and more likely to view a young pregnancy as a good thing.

So, how about instead of yelling at Hollywood for not making this seem all horrible and terrible for every single girl, we start looking at the Bush Administration (and school boards and state Departments of Education) for pushing abstinence-only education? And then we should probably look at rising economic inequality (fed by, among other things, government policies) for failing to convince a large part of generations of women that they can't expect any more than their mothers had? And then we might want to take a deep and non-judgmental breath and start thinking about the generation or two of parents who failed to effectively parent their girls to believe that they can do anything a boy can do and then some.

No, wait, it's just easier to blame Diablo Cody. Never mind.

Teen Pregnancy, Hollywood Style [Newsweek]
Teen 'Pregnancy Pact' Has 17 Girls Expecting [MSNBC]
Reducing Teenage Pregnancy [Planned Parenthood]

And Juno, which I finally saw (and cried during, but I was on a plane) and thought, "How is this not a pro-life movie?" Because you know, you wouldn't call it pro-choice, because she doesn't take advantage of the "choice" that's so endangered, even though you could make a Juno: China and you'd have a story that's slightly more P.C. And did it depict a kid for whom having a child was just one more oddball alternakid consumer choice she made, like with her collection of gory horror movies and retro flannel jackets, and thus a cynical GOP-funded marketing ploy whose appeal to a certain psychographic of bored punk rock-listening teenagers must now be answered by the Starbucks of reproductive health? Because I could argue that point with crystal clear logic in a Diablo Cody hit piece wryly referencing the opening line of Sex & The City about how women move to New York for the "two L's: Love and Labels," but the truth is I have no desire to diss Diablo Cody or the Indiana Planned Parenthood, not until I see the documents detailing the Build-A-Bear-bankrolled conspiracy, and that's the cool thing about opinions is they're also a "choice."

Clinic Teams With Adoption Agency In NWI [Post-Trib]
Earlier: How Pretty, Profitable, Should Planned Parenthood Be?
Portland Builder Drops Planned Parenthood For Fear Of Pro Life Protesters

As someone who grew up on flicks like Desperately Seeking Susan and The Craft, I'm disappointed that, out of the 110 flicks counted, xkcd says, "There were over sixty movies in the sample with two male stars top-billed. The only movies with two top-billed female roles, on the other hand, were The Devil Wears Prada and Scary Movie 4." And sure, there's Juno and Little Miss Sunshine, but are they the norm? He continues:

My cousin has been working on tallying (by hand!) all movies with two top-billed female stars. She reports that there are staggeringly few of them, and the roles fall mainly in two genres: mother-daughter bonding movies and horror films.

Two Female Leads [xkcd]
Related: Whither Our Superheroines? An Outraged Culture Demands To Know [Defamer]
Earlier: The Future Of Female Comedies May Sit Squarely On Tina Fey's Shoulders
Where The Hell Are The Strong Women?
Women In Hollywood Speak Out On Women In Hollywood
"Cordial", "Charming" Studio Chief Explains Why Women Can't Sell Movies (Except Julia Roberts)

The Anti-Juno [FourFour]

Slate:

Too bad the movie's central relationship, the prickly courtship between Wetherhold and his doctor girlfriend, never finds its momentum. Quaid and Sarah Jessica Parker, both terrific, aren't to blame. The problem is that their relationship proceeds according to the As Good as It Gets law, which dictates that angry, paunchy, deeply disturbed old men in the movies need only to dial down their unpleasantness by 5 percent to win the affection of smart, kind, beautiful young women.

Its pretty conventional characters are often pretty funny. Or maybe I should say, surprisingly interesting. Ellen Page (recently of =Juno ) brings her wise-child persona to a somewhat more mature character with ironic expertise. The same can be said of Church, who knows how to do slackers, without seeming to be one as an actor. Paradoxically, he's an energetic slob. Parker probably has the toughest assignment here, as a smart woman making a dumb choice. But she has charm and perkiness and if she doesn't entirely persuade us to suspend disbelief, she at least gets us to elide it.

Noam Murro's feature debut, "Smart People," suffers from that kind of perspiration problem. There's not a minute in the picture where we're not reminded, either by a too-polished line of dialogue or a precociously unstudied camera angle, that this is a movie for an intelligent, sophisticated audience, an audience who just naturally gets it. "Smart People" is so preoccupied with congratulating us for getting it that it fails to give us much to get in the first place, even though it features a respectable ensemble of actors — among them Dennis Quaid, Thomas Haden Church and Sarah Jessica Parker — squeezing as hard as they can to wring some life from the material.

In addition to the machinations of father, daughter and brother, there is a flimsy subplot involving Quaid's son (Ashton Holmes), a college student with literary aspirations of his own. Mystifyingly, there is a young female character who plays a student of Quaid's who also shows up on his college's search committee for department chairman. No explanation is made, making it seem as if the filmmakers were scrimping on hiring actors.

Ellen Page does the best she can as a teen automaton who wants her Dad to stop holding onto Mom's old clothes because if he donates them to charity they'll get a tax write-off, "which is pretty cool." But this pitiless caricature of Young Republicanhood is meant for broader farce, not a dreary dramedy like Smart People. As it is, it's hard to shake the impression of Juno MacGuff offering an ironic portrait of Tracy Flick.

But as refreshing as it is to hear people speak in complete paragraphs in a movie, these characters all feel vaguely familiar. Page, fresh off her career-making star turn in last year's "Juno," affects the same irritatingly prolix persona of that movie's precocious title character, the only difference being that Vanessa is a Young Republican. As the commitment-phobic doctor, Parker often resembles Carrie Bradshaw in a white coat, plying the same approach-avoid technique for romance that propelled "Sex and the City" season after season. And for all the sympathy Quaid implicitly brings to the stock character of unrepentant academic misanthrope, Wetherhold's pomposity and pedantry fit too squarely into what is by now an overused mold.

Lawrence, a widower not so secretly married to his grief, hides behind a façade of insouciance fortified with truculence. If he were more readily likable, the movie would be predictable, but he isn't, and it isn't (except, perhaps, for a flagrantly feel-good end-title sequence). This is some of the best work Mr. Quaid has done in an always interesting career. Since he's an exceedingly likable actor, he can play Lawrence as a pompous stranger to his children (he also has a son, a closet poet) and the despair of colleagues who think they know him, yet keep us rooting for him all the way.

That may sound like a minor accomplishment, but the great virtue of "Smart People," attributable to Noam Murro's easygoing direction as well as to Mr. Poirier's wandering screenplay, lies in its general preference for small insights over grand revelations. There is a fairly busy plot, and some of its developments — an unplanned pregnancy, a flicker of quasi-incestuous sexual interest, the acceptance of a poem by The New Yorker — clatter onto the screen like carelessly flung darts. But to a greater extent than in most comedies, the narrative seems more like background or scaffolding than like the engine that drives the characters, who are propelled instead by their own colliding, confusing, idiosyncratic energies.

Every year, Stuart Weitzman has a woman wear a million dollar pair of heels on the Oscars' red carpet. If you're a Hollywood enthusiast, or insider, you know this; Cody, apparently, didn't. So she blogged about it: "I must have somehow missed the part where my shoes cost a MILLION FUCKING DOLLARS and my 'choice' of footwear would be publicized nationwide... This looks really attention-whorey, and for once, I didn't do it on purpose." Stuart Weitzman responded, noting that Cody selected the shoes herself (which she doesn't deny) and stated: "I offered her the opportunity initially because I so enjoyed her film, and I'm very happy for her success." But the incident — and Cody's newfound place in the spotlight —rubs some people the wrong way. Comments on a Stuart Weitzman-related post over at Oh No They Didn't range from mean-spirited to insulting to downright misogynistic. "It seems as if everyone involved with Juno drank some kool aid that turned them into self-important bitches this awards season," says Disco_Balla. "Uh, you're a stripper/screenwriter. Whoring out should not be a problem for you," writes Gobbledoo. Commenter Idiophone says, "That bitch shouldn't even be invited." "Yeah shes a cunt," chimes in Superhyphy. A reader named Helen who brought this post to our attention via email asks:

What is it about unconventional women that make people (especially other women) hate on them so viciously for any perceived missteps? It's like nothing's changed in a thousand years and we just love to pick up big ol' sharp things and chuck 'em at the first "cunt" who talks too much out of turn. I'm sick of sitting around while women kick other women in the face.I am pretty sure that whatever Cody does or doesn't deserve, she gets more (pointed, claws-out) hate than an equally eccentric man.

Diablo Cody Pays the Price of Fame, Too [Breitbart]
Women Screenwriters In Oscar Spotlight [Showbuzz/CBS News]
Diablo Cody's Blog [MySpace]
Earlier: Diablo Cody: A Flash Of Leg, A Tear And An Oscar
Behind The Scenes Of Juno With "Diablo Cody"
Do The Oscars Really Need A "Best Actress" Category?

Best Supporting Actress:
Cate Blanchett, I'm Not There: Come on, she plays that genius music man Bob Dylan! Who was most definitely not a victim. Or a hooker. Or even a woman. Verdict: OK!

Tilda Swinton, Michael Clayton: As Hillary Clinton taught us, even if other people try to hate on you, once a ball-busting lawyer, always a ball-busting lawyer. Which means that Swinton's character gets a Verdict: OK!

Ruby Dee, American Gangster: Yeah, it's sort of an iron-clad rule. Playing the guilt-ridden mother of a heroin dealer leaves no other option than Verdict: Victim!

Amy Ryan, Gone Baby Gone: She's an alcoholic. And her kid goes missing. Most definitely Verdict: Victim!

Saorise Ronan, Atonement: Once she reaches young adulthood, her character attempts to correct an error in judgment she had as a child by (spoiler alert!) concocting and selling a fictitious version of events. Which makes her either a crazy or a sociopath. No matter how you look at it, dying alone with regret makes you a guaranteed Verdict: Victim! (Even if you're the one making others into victims. Life is complicated like that, natch.)


Best Actress:

[Note: All of these nominees are sorta hard to pin down, so dangerously close do they dance between the line of victim/not-victim. So instead, we simply consulted our Magic 8-Ball.]

Julie Christie, Away From Her: Gets Alzheimer's, has to go to a nursing home, but then finds love. Too bad she's married! The story is sad, but good for her for finding some happiness. Also, isn't it not politically correct to call a person with Alzheimer's a "victim"? Verdict: Signs point to "no".

Marion Cotillard, La Vie En Rose: Her mother was an alcoholic and she grows up to be one too, in addition to, you know, real-life French chanteuse Edith Piaf. Also, has string of bad relationships and loses her only child. But she's a star, people, a star! Does becoming one of the biggest talents of our time cancel out the tragedy? Verdict: Absolutely.

Laura Linney, The Savages: Has a bad temp job, wants to be a playwright, denied every grant she's ever applied for, involved with a married man, father is dying. But: she's the smart and sassy sister to Philip Seymour Hoffman's even more pathetic brother, which means we're willing to give her the big ol' Verdict: My Sources Say No

Ellen Page, Juno: Has unprotected sex, gets pregnant, decides to keep the baby and give it up for adoption. By movie's end, she's landed her dream man (her dorky best friend), learned that childbirth is painful, makes a woman who wants to be a mom happy, grows closer with her own parents, and even manages to slink back down to original svelte teen-aged self when it's all over. Here's a girl who gets pregnant and refuses to play the victim, which somehow heightens the unavoidable sadness and gravity of the situation. Verdict: Outlook Not So Good

Earlier: Oscar Noms 2008: Women Can Write, Not Direct

Best Supporting Actress:
Cate Blanchett — I'm Not There
Tilda Swinton — Michael Clayton
Amy Ryan — Gone Baby Gone
Ruby Dee — American Gangster
Saorise Ronan — Atonement

Best Supporting Actor:
Casey Affleck — The Assassination of Jesse James By The Coward Robert Ford
Javier bardem — No Country For Old Men
Philip Seymour Hoffman — Charlie Wilson's War
Hal Holbrook — Into The Wild
Tom WIlkinson — Michael Clayton

Best Actress:
Cate Blanchett — Elizabeth: The Golden Age
Julie Christie — Away From Her
Marion Cotillard — La Vie En Rose
Laura Linney — The Savages
Ellen Page — Juno

Best Actor:
George Clooney — Michael Clayton
Daniel Day-Lewis — There Will Be Blood
Johnny Depp — Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber Of Fleet Street
Tommy Lee Jones — In The Valley Of Elah
Viggo Mortensen — Eastern Promises

Best Director:
Ethan and Joel Coen — No Country for Old Men
Paul Thomas Anderson — There Will Be Blood
Julian Schnabel — The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Jason Reitman — Juno
Tony Gilroy — Michael Clayton

Best Original Screenplay:
Tamara Jenkins — The Savages
Diablo Cody — Juno
Nancy Oliver — Lars and the Real Girl
Tony Gilroy — Michael Clayton
Brad Bird, Jim Capobianco, Jan Pinkava — Ratatouille

Best Adapted Screenplay:
Atonement — Christopher Hampton
Away From Her — Sarah Polley
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly — Ronald Harwood
No Country For Old Men — Ethan and Joel Cohen
There Will Be Blood — Paul Thomas Anderson

Best Picture:
Atonement
Juno
Michael Clayton
No Country For Old Men
There Will Be Blood

No Country, Blood Lead Oscar Nominations [Reuters]

I had my first abortion at the age of 18, while in the early throes of a love affair that eventually turned emotionally abusive. Fresh off my first year of college, I fell pregnant through a combination of raging hormones, high fertility, and, most notably, sheer recklessness. Four weeks later, hunched over and damp with tears after undergoing a D&C at my local Planned Parenthood, I vowed I'd never behave that stupidly again.

Talk about famous last words: Six years later, I did just that.

I could go on and on about my unwillingness to have a child, about the unsuitability of my romantic partners, or the precariousness of my financial situation as a young women in the big city without a trust-fund or even a savings account. I could talk about the dreams I had for my future, dreams that did not include a changing diapers, nursery school and single motherhood. I could express my belief that the embryos that existed inside me for four weeks were not fully-formed, functioning human beings. And I could converse for hours about my terror at the thought of disappointing my parents, or the long-held conviction (as a young girl I had walked hand-in-hand with my mother at many an abortion-rights march) that it was my right to control over what happened to my body, and that, when push came to shove, if I was going to talk the talk, I was sure as hell going to walk the walk.

But eventually I'd have to come back to the simple fact that, no matter how educated and "aware" I was, when I got pregnant I was young, stupid, and yes, "selfish". (Tracie, who's been through it too, disagrees: "It's not selfish. Having a baby and then not being a good mother would be selfish.") There was nothing comedic, heartwarming or cinematic (a la Juno and Knocked Up) about my getting pregnant (except for the time I was heating up soup in the kitchen and realized I was both barefoot and pregnant), or my choice to end a pregnancy. But most importantly, I was simply not willing or ready to have a child; I was just a baby myself. And although I can't speak of the reasons and realities behind the other third of American women who've undergone abortions over the past three and a half decades, perhaps some of you can?

Who's Getting Abortions? Not Who You'd Think [MSNBC, via AP]
If Men Could Get Pregnant, Abortion Would Be A Sacrament [Huffington Post]
Pregnancy Films Like 'Juno' Skip Message, Go For The Humor [USA Today]

Earlier: Experts Don't Understand Why Fewer American Women Are Getting Abortions
•Do You Care How Dudes Feel About Their Abortions?
•How Much Time Should Women Spend In Prison For Having Abortions?
•How Old Is Too Old To Have An Abortion?