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The makers of Sydney White have taken on the time-honored task – previously tackled by everyone from the Muppets to the Three Stooges – of generating comedy through a modern-day adaption of a fairy tale or fable. Here, they attempt to turn "Snow White & the Seven Dwarfs" into a college comedy vehicle for TV sitcom star Amanda Bynes. It ought to be a no-brainer assignment, assured of easy success with Bynes' tween fanbase. Unfortunately, the plan apparently got sidetracked along the way. I imagine a Universal executive saying, "I love the idea. But wasn't Revenge of the Nerds a big hit? Make it more like that."
The script tries to make its way along a narrow line, incorporating passing references to typically raunchy college comedy material without violating its PG-13 rating. This leads to some awkward and uncomfortable situations, and not the funny kind you want in a comedy. In the opening sequence, we meet title heroine Sydney (Bynes) as she is getting ready to leave home for university for the first time. Her widowed dad (John Schneider) is a plumber who raised his daughter on construction sites, which has made her into something of a tomboy, more comfortable with tools than with boys. Dad throws her a goodbye party, inviting all of his construction buddies that helped raise Sydney. A big carpenter tears up and hugs Sydney – way too long. This bit is supposed to be amusing, showing the puppy-dog devotion this sweet teen inspires, but in execution it's kind of creepy.
As a legacy, Sydney is assured a place in her mom's old sorority. This irks evil campus queen Rachel (blonde beauty Sara Paxton), who doesn't like the way Sydney influences the other girls with her blue collar attitudes. Sydney also becomes popular with Rachel's ex-boyfriend Tyler Prince (Matt Long), making Rachel jealous. Her jealousy explodes when Sydney rises to the top of the sorority's popularity-tracking Web site, leading her to plot a humiliating ejection from the house for the freshman.
Homeless, Sydney is taken in by the seven inhabitants of The Vortex – an unchartered, dilapidated house on campus that has become a place for the social system's ultimate rejects. The seven "dorks" (as they are labeled) each bear a distinctive social liability, much like the dwarfs of the classic Disney animated version of the story. There's a Grumpy character (Danny Strong) who writes for a radical Web site. There's Sleepy character – an African exchange student (Donte Bonner) who never adjusted to the time change. And there's a character named Spanky (Samme Levine) who spends a lot of time by himself thinking about girls. It's not spelled out just what Spanky is doing so compulsively, but it's implied that it's unhealthy. This wouldn't be all that funny in an R-rated college comedy, so here, it's (again) just creepy.
Other than trying to include this type of material in a PG-13 comedy aimed mainly at young girls, Sydney White is a harmless, fluffy flick. It even tries to provide some social commentary about class consciousness and acceptance of diversity. It delivers some laughs, and some of the twists on the original story – particularly the "poison Apple" gag – are kind of clever.
But someone needs to coach Ms. Bynes before her next feature, hopefully a more experienced director than White's Joe Nussbaum, auteur of the hit internet short George Lucas in Love. She still mugs broadly in every scene, which might play all right on a tiny TV screen, but becomes headache-inducing on a big theater screen.
This movie begins playing at these theaters Sept. 21:
Kerasotes Niles ShowPlace 12 301 Golf Mill Center, Niles, IL 60714
AMC Loews Gardens 7/13 175 Old Orchard Center, Skokie, IL 60077
