Jennifer's Body

Blurring the line between chick flick and horror, Jennifer’s Body is a comedy/horror, laced with plenty of gore, action, and Megan Fox to keep the audience amused for its run time. An interesting, though unoriginal plotline and some other minor issues hold this picture back from being a top notch production, but Jennifer’s Body is an overall enjoyable movie.

Amanda Seyfried stars as “Needy”, the nerdy best friend of Jennifer (Megan Fox), a beautiful, popular and rebellious cheerleader. After narrowly escaping a bar fire, Jennifer gets into a van with a mysterious band, who were performing at the very same bar. However, when next we see Jennifer, she’s covered in blood, and has now been possessed by a demon, who needs to feast on human flesh to keep her strength up. When the bodies of fellow students begin to appear, it’s up to Needy to save the day. It’s a narrative that’s been done countless times before, and is far from original, but it’s still entertaining to see a new take on it, in the form of a high school cheerleader/murderer.

Amanda Seyfried once again delivers a spectacular performance, showing just how diverse she actually is. The prologue and epilogue show her as a hardened, foul-mouthed criminal in what appears to be a prison, then within a few seconds gap, we see her as the geeky friend again. Megan Fox also stretches her acting talent to the full as the possessed cheerleader...which still isn’t very good to be honest. Fox once again relies on her typical “I’m hot, so I don’t need to act” routine (cough cough, Transformers, cough cough). The director clearly wanted to exploit this, by putting her in the smallest clothing he could find, then smearing her with blood. Once or twice she does manage to give a relatively convincing display of terror or evil, but this is quickly squandered in the next scene, where she basically just reads lines in some tiny shorts.

Allowances could have been made, if the script that she was reading from was in any way...good. The way that the characters are so blunt with the way they speak their mind starts off as being relatively amusing, as you assume it’s just ‘that character’. But when you see that all the characters speak this way, it feels almost patronising, as if the script has been dumbed down for a wider audience. The level of gore narrows the audience dramatically though, so I couldn’t help but feel that the intended audience would’ve been able to understand an innuendo or two, rather than Fox overusing the F-bomb.

Despite the dumbed-down script, and Fox’s mediocre performances, the film does hit quite a few highs. Lovers of gore will be pleased, as there are some rather graphic scenes depicting Megan Fox chowwing down on some unassuming boy, and the fear factor is definitely there, but mostly due to tension, rather than making the audience jump. The soundtrack is also brilliant, featuring songs from Panic at The Disco, Florence and the Machine, and the fictional band Low Shoulder, with the song Through the Trees.

Whilst it isn’t one of my favourite films that I’ve seen this year, Jennifer’s Body is far from the worst. If you just look past the unoriginal story, or some dodgy acting, you’ll find an entertaining romp that’s definitely worth watching. Amanda Seyfried steals the show, and once again proves how diverse and talented she really is.

7/10 - Good