Aquamarine (2006) More at IMDb Pro »

I promised my sister I would take her to a movie for her birthday and buy her popcorn a few weeks ago, and today was the day we settled on. I was pushing for Failure to Launch or She's the Man, but my sister was determined to see Aquamarine. So fifteen dollars later we were all nestled in. The movie starts off extremely slow and was, in my opinion, painful to watch. I must admit I was much more entertained with thinking of ways that I could sneak in to The Hills Have Eyes, which was playing at the theater across from ours. But in the end I stayed for the movie, giving me plenty of time to think over my criticisms. I think Emma Roberts (timid and diminutive Claire) may be a rare star who started out acting fairly well and is getting worse. I thought her early Unfabulous days were good, but now I can barely stand to watch the show. Her over-the-top mugging drives me insane. I wasn't expecting much out of JoJo (bold and strong Hailey) at all. I knew it wasn't exactly fair writing her off for being a singer, but that's what I did. And I was extremely, pleasantly surprised. She did a great job, I thought. I wasn't expecting much from Sara Paxton (the titular mermaid Aquamarine) judging by the painful "I see we're going to have to take this slow: Mer Maid" in the trailers, but she ended up doing okay. All in all, it wasn't a great movie, but it picks up in the second half and finishes well, so it was a pretty decent way to spend almost two hours on a cold Saturday afternoon. Although next time, I think I'll pick the movie.