As cool as the title sounds, the entire movie is far from making that definition. The film centers around a sixteen year old girl, Lucy, whose father is rarely at home because of his job as a lumberjack and so lives with her socially open, sexually flaunting mother. Her parents got married at the early age of seventeen to raise Lucy when she unexpectedly bloomed in her mother's stomach. She starts having a friends with benefits relationship with her best friend, Kenny, as both of them start to question where their friendship may lead with a innocent kiss.
The film begins innocently enough, with Lucy and Kenny literally hanging at a park upside down on the monkeybar. She offers to kiss the playground bully, Scott in return for him to not disturb Kenny anymore, which the flustered male agrees to. The two share a rather awkward peck before they break apart and Scott accuses Lucy of being a terrible kisser. In order to forget that disgusting episode, Lucy kisses Kenny to make up for it, claiming the memories are 'malleable' and liable to change.
This is where i should have recognized the stop signs and un-stream the video right there and then. Instead i was forced to sit through two hours of distracted sex, a trifle of repeated mistakes with agonizing 'what ifs,' and the hook-and-dump boy race.
'As cool as I am' constantly changes its pace and mood, therefore confusing the viewer and making them unsure of how to respond back with the right emotions. The movie introduces a strong female lead in the beginning, so i assumed she would have a non-affinity for the sex department and focus on building emotional support for her family instead. It actually manages to pull through with this concept for a while, until a particular scene where her father argues with Kenny's mother that his daughter may be having a sexual relationship with Kenny.
Not wanting her to end up pregnant and throwing away her life like he did, Dad emphasizes again and again how much he only wants the best for her and that means not having underage sex. Lucy even goes as far as making a promise to Kenny that they both wont ever have sex again, not until they're old enough and have their parents' consent. Just when you think this film is finally making sense, finally digging itself a successfull concept- it buries itself deeper into the hole.
In a burst of impulse Lucy climbs in Kenny's window and demand that they have sex again. Kenny asks of her promise and she gives the same flimsy excuse- that memories are malleable and prone to change.
Once again, we're thrown off the hook and are unable to find someplace to hold on to because all common sense and logic has been abandoned. Whatever happened to the firm decision before? She accuses her mother of having an affair with other men but does not realize how her actions might end her up in that situation as well. She is aware of her parents history yet does not give a second thought to which she might end up like them.
What is even more frustrating is her substitution of boyfriends which she freely sleeps with them then ends up regretting it. EVERY SINGLE TIME. Which is stupid, because you think she might have the brains by now to think twice before getting in bed with a stranger which ultimately led to her parents situation.
Another subplot that the film fails to develop is Lucy's relationship with her father. It is hinted at the beginning that she misses her father constantly and looks forward to his visits. It is the potential growth for a bond that most teenagers would be able to relate to; the steady figure of their father that they can rely on. However, not only does he fail to give that impression, but he dissappears slowly from the picture that you begin to question if he was of any significance at all.
In fact, I'm starting to question if this film has any significance to real life at all. Its a great movie for a young girl's struggle and search in life, but fails to nail down a central point. It goes back and forth between a romantic comedy and dysfunctional family which i cant pin head or tail.
In the end, this isn't a film any viewer would walk away saying, 'I enjoyed that.' Teens with a single parent might relate, but how many percentage of teenagers do we have that their fathers work as lumberjacks and comes back four or five times a year, with a mother that sexually flaunts her feminity every chance she gets?
Not many. Yeah.
