Aquamarine (www.the-usher.com)

"I need to find love in three days"

With only a few days before she moves to Australia, Hailey (Levesque) is finding it hard to say goodbye to her best friend Claire (Roberts), so on the night of a big storm they make a wish that something would happen to keep their friendship alive. Waking the next morning they find something in their pool that might just change anything, a mermaid called Aquamarine (Paxton).

The beach, boys, clothes and mermaids, this is definitely a teenage girly flick but there anything for the rest of the audience to enjoy?

'Aquamarine' is a movie made simply for an audience of teenage girls, meaning everyone else will find this difficult to watch. Shopping, teen magazines, clothes, boys and most importantly friendship are movie's main themes, everything a teenage girl will enjoy and then when you throw in a little bit of magic in the shape of a mermaid, this is a film that they will adore.

The key reason behind why the film will work for them is the trio of lead actresses. Joanna 'JoJo' Levesque, Emma Roberts and Sara Paxton have real friendship chemistry as Hailey, Claire and Aquamarine. It is easy to think that Hailey and Claire are best friends who don't quite fit in with everyone else in their Florida beach town, as JoJo and Emma act and look like average teenage girls with real problems and fears. This allows most girls to connect with them extremely easily, as they are not the most popular or caterpillars waiting to turn into butterflies. It is only when Aquamarine comes into their lives that they finally start to appreciate who they are and the strength of their friendship.

Aquamarine herself is the usual fish out of water. The character, played by the talented and beautiful Sara Paxton, is a typical mermaid who has just got her land legs. Fascinated by the human world, she sees everything with the widest eyes but oozes confidence in everything she does. Having only three days to make someone fall in love with her to prove to her mermaid father that love actually exists, is your usual far fetched storyline for a film like this but Sara Paxton, Joanna Levesque and Emma Roberts make it a lot more watchable than it should have been.

Add in some decent performances from Arielle Kebbel as the most popular and self-proclaimed princess of their small Florida beach town, Cecilia and Jake McDorman as a slightly too old look object of the girls affections, Raymond and you have a cast that does a first rate job.

'Aquamarine' is a movie aimed exclusive at teenage girls and for that audience it works. Everyone else however will struggle to find much to enjoy but why would adults and teenage boys want to watch a movie about friendship, shopping, clothes and love anyway as you'll only end up feeling like fish out of water.

PICTURE & SOUND

Presented in Anamorphic Widescreen 1.85:1 with Dolby Digital 5.1, the movie is presented extremely well.

BONUS FEATURES

Introduction by director Elizabeth Allen (0.12 mins)
The director tells you what the movie is all about.

Deleted Scenes (4.40 mins)
'Feet are fun', 'The men's room', 'Fish out of water', 'Claire's photo album', 'They found fish' and 'Fishy Cecilla', these deleted or extended scenes suffer from the lack of a commentary track or introduction to say why they were removed.

Awesome Auditions (5.20 mins)
Director Elizabeth Allen introduces the auditions for Sara Paxton, Emma Roberts, Jo Jo, Jake McDorman and Arielle Kebbel.

Kickin' it on the Set (5.09 mins)
A montage of behind the scenes footage and outtakes from 'Aquamarine'

OVERALL

With extremely short featurettes and some deleted scenes, the DVD bonus material for 'Aquamarine' is very disappointing. Fans of the film will feel let down by the lack of a commentary and more information on the girls.

DVD

The Little Mermaid

Splash

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2006