Review: Whip It!****

Youth springs eternal for Ellen Page. Oscar nominated for her role as a pregnant 16-year-old in the raucous comedy Juno, the 23-year-old Canadian actress has forged a career playing dysfunctional and pithy teenagers.
By The Newsroom
Published 9th Apr 2010, 13:39 BST
Updated 14th Apr 2010, 13:27 BST

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There are more growing pains in Whip It!, the auspicious directorial debut of Drew Barrymore, based on the novel Derby Girl by Shauna Cross.

Set in the cutthroat world of women's roller derby, this unabashedly entertaining tale of female empowerment puts a traditional coming-of-age story on four wheels and celebrates the sisterly solidarity within a low-ranked team as its feisty members body-check their way up the league.

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Novelist Cross lovingly adapts her book for the screen and she retains all of the humour and the pathos, keeping the tone relatively light to hold the interest of teenage audiences who will appreciate the heroine's struggle for independence and the hip soundtrack laden with Kaiser Chiefs, MGMT, The Breeders, Peaches and The Raveonettes.

Ungainly teenager, Bliss Cavendar (Page), lives in small town Texas, where she is at the mercy of her beauty-pageant obsessed mom, Brooke (Marcia Gay Harden).

One day Bliss sees a flyer for roller derby trials and she secretly attends the tryout. Whip It! follows in the tracks of countless other portraits of teen angst but director Barrymore invests her first feature with infectious energy. Page imbues Bliss with spunk and vulnerability and the scenes with Harden's pushy mother run the gamut of laughter and tears.

Related topics:Texas