Bring It On vs. Sugar & Spice

This looks at two films about cheerleaders which were released within a year of each other.

School is back in session in many areas, and as anyone who’s been to one knows, one prominent aspect of high school is cheerleading. This is why I’m now comparing two movies involving cheerleaders.

Bring It On (2000)

This film centers on San Diego high schooler Torrance Shipman (Kirsten Dunst), who begins her senior year on a nice note as she becomes the captain of her school’s cheerleading squad, the Toros. As such, she begins priming them for the upcoming national title, which the team has already won for the previous five years. But her teammate Carver (Bianca Kajlich) is injured, prompting Torrance to search for a replacement. One is found in new student Missy Pantone (Eliza Dushku), in whom Torrance sees potential, although her other teammates think she’s too much of an outcast.

Torrance is surprised when Missy, after seeing the Toros practice, thinks Torrance is a thief as she recognizes the team’s moves are being used by another team from another high school. After Torrance convinces her of her ignorance in the matter, Missy takes her to Los Angeles and shows her that team, the East Compton Clovers. Torrance learns that the previous captain came by and recorded/stole these moves from the Clovers, and if that’s not bad enough, the team’s leader Isis (Gabrielle Union) takes an understandably-pissed off stance against Torrance and Missy before they can leave.

Alas, this doesn’t prevent the Toros from using the same routine at their next home game. Not surprisingly, this leads to the Clovers showing up to humiliate them by performing the same moves. Torrance sets out to create a new routine, but the choreographer they hire teaches the same act to another team, which Torrance discovers at the regionals. The Toros still get earn their place in the nationals, but Torrance is strongly warned to get a new act for them.

She considers resigning, but is supported by Missy’s brother Cliff (Jesse Bradford). But Torrance’s college boyfriend Aaron (Richard Hillman), who recommended the choreographer, tells her that this isn’t the position for her, to the delight of her teammates Courtney (Clare Kramer) and Whitney (Nicole Bilderback), who’d love to replace Torrance. The fact that her boyfriend cheats on her doesn’t help either.

Cliff’s support wavers after he sees Torrance with Aaron. But Torrance manages to convince her team to create a new routine, and to break up with Aaron. She even tries to give the Clovers a hand by offering them money to compete in the nationals, which they had been unable to do in previous years due to financial issues. Isis declines and gets the Clovers to the nationals thanks to a local talk show host.

At the nationals, the Clovers win, with the Toros placing second. Torrance and Cliff kiss and make up and she and Isis happily convey their respect for each other.

Sugar & Spice (2001)

Just one year after Bring It On came another movie about cheerleaders. The cheerleaders at Lincoln High band together after their captain Diane Weston (Marley Shelton) becomes pregnant thanks to her boyfriend, the school’s quarterback Jack Bartlett (James Marsden). The two are definitely made for each other as they both share the same air-headed personality. This is why Jack has trouble getting a job to support his new family after their parents kick them out of their homes, forcing them to get an apartment. Jack does, however, manage to get a job at a video store.

But the hardship of this new lifestyle prompts Diane to enlist her four teammates Kansas Hill (Mena Suvari), Cleo Miller (Melissa George), Lucy Whitmore (Sara Marsh), and Hannah Wald (Rachel Blanchard) into planning a robbery, specifically by robbing a safe at the supermarket Diane works at. They also pledge to keep this all a secret from Jack.

They prep for this by watching heist movies such as Dog Day Afternoon, and as it turns out, Kansas’s mom (Sean Young) knows where they can get weapons thanks to her contacts at the prison where she’s a resident. This leads the girls to a bug exterminator (W. Earl Brown) who calls himself the “Terminator” (how original). He agrees to sell them weapons on the condition that his shy daughter Fern Rogers (Alexandra Holden) can join their squad. They agree.

Our squad is soon simultaneously prepping for the heist and practicing choreography for the upcoming winter ball. They also order masks. But Lucy has second thoughts, thinking this could jeopardize the scholarship she just got to Harvard. On top of that, they’re in need of a getaway car, which they get when Fern says they can use her dad’s van, although the brakes aren’t the best. Diane is even somewhat guilt-ridden when she learns Jack sold his GTO to get her an engagement ring.

When the day of the robbery arrives, Lucy comes along as well, having changed her mind, and, amusingly, has to wear a Richard Nixon mask, while the others are wearing the blonde doll masks that Kansas’s mom helped get for them. The robbery itself succeeds, although one of the guns our girls are carrying goes off, nearly shooting a customer. The robbery quickly hits the news.

After celebrating and burning their costumes, the resentful Lisa Janusch (Marla Sokoloff), who’s jealous of Diane for both being the cheerleading captain and winning Jack’s heart, reveals that since she was one of the customers being held at gunpoint at the time of the robbery, she recognized the stunts the squad performed in order to block the cameras at the market. The FBI takes the squad in.

But Diane makes a deal with Lisa: she’ll make her the captain (since Diane’s pregnancy is preventing her from doing much cheerleading anyway) as long as she keeps her mouth shut. Diane’s teammates hate this deal, but are sympathetic as to why Diane made it. She informs Jack that they have more money because she won the lottery, and all of the squad go on to nice things with their shares of the cash.

Which is better?

In terms of laughs, Sugar & Spice has the edge, basically because it’s silly and it knows it. The cast all performs accordingly, especially Shelton (and, unlike her appearances in Valentine and Bubble Boy, which were both released the same year, I’m pretty sure this was intentional). But Young steals the show as Kansas’s bizarre mother, which may be appropriate considering how bizarre Young herself has been reported to be. The way our heroines slap their bums when they chant their motto is also sure to provide a chuckle.

The film is sometimes too silly for its own good. For instance, Cleo’s obsession with Conan O’Brien loses its laugh factor pretty quickly, although her freakiest moment is her admitting that the sight of Jesus on the cross turns her on. Ironically, the film’s writer, Lona Williams, had her name removed from the movie after the producers asked that the script’s darker content be toned down following the tragedy at Columbine. In fact, the film’s original title was Sugar & Spice & Semi-Automatics. The story was partially based on a series of robberies perpetrated by a group of teenage girls in Texas in 1999. Unlike the film, the actual girls cited mere boredom as the motivation for their crime spree, and also unlike the film, they had to spend a little more time behind bars.

Suvari is also underused, which is both disappointing and surprising considering that she had already scored big time with the one-two punch of American Pie and American Beauty. It’s unfortunate that none of her subsequent roles have been on par with her work in those two films.

But Bring It On is probably the better of the two, mainly because for those looking for a cheerleader film, this film actually goes into the details of that field. In contrast, Sugar & Spice simply uses cheer as background to get into its heist plot. Also, Bring It On at least tries to bring something original to the teen comedy formula. Yes, we have the “girl must dump bad boy for one better for her” cliche, but Dunst is likable throughout, while Dushku and Union both have appealing characters to play as well. Not surprisingly, all three actresses got nice career boosts thanks to this film.

Like the aforementioned American Pie, which came out the previous year, Bring It On would have numerous sequels, but unlike that film, none of them featured any cast members from the original. Sugar & Spice on the other hand ended up being a box-office flop. That’s a shame, because while certainly not perfect, it does make for a pleasant enough time killer if you turn your brain off.

Star Trek: Picard

This article discusses what I hope we will see with the upcoming Star Trek series.

As most everyone is aware by now, the next Star Trek series, Star Trek: Picard, is set to begin on CBS All Access next year. Like Star Trek: Discovery, it will only be available for viewing on the CBS site and is produced by the same behind-the-scenes team as that series, including Alex Kurtzman and Rod Roddenberry (Gene’s son).

The title, naturally, implies that it will focus on Sir Patrick Stewart’s famous character, who was last seen 17 years earlier in Star Trek: Nemesis. The trailers for the series show us a Picard who’s become somewhat saddened in the years since Nemesis—though not because of the movie itself, although that would be understandable. Data’s death in that film is referenced, and Brent Spiner is even seen reprising his role. Other Trek alumni who are confirmed to make appearances on the show are Jeri Ryan’s Seven of Nine, as well as Jonathan Frakes’s Riker and Marina Sirtis’s Troi. Frakes is even set to direct some episodes.

All this certainly sounds promising. But as experience has more or less taught me, promise should be tempered with concern. I suppose that concern is brought on by the fact that the current Trek series, Discovery, isn’t exactly endearing itself to Trek fans the way the network hoped it would. The fact that there were reported changes in the behind-the-scenes staff on that show is just the tip of the iceberg. But the show is currently viewed by many as just treading the same ground the original Star Trek series and Star Trek: The Next Generation already did. Yes, things could potentially turn around for Discovery in its upcoming third season, but I’m concerned that Picard could fall into this same trap.

This brings me to what I hope this new show will bring to the table.

One of my major complaints with the four Next Generation movies was that they failed to take advantage of the rich tapestry of stories that the show itself provided. Yes, we did get some bones thrown to us in that regard, most famously the Borg in First Contact (which is why Voyager would then take that ball and run with it, straight into the ground). But these were, in the end, solely used to get to the next action scene in the film they were in. Contrast this with the original series films, which brought back a memorable antagonist for its second installment with a story that nicely segued into three of the four movies that came after it.

My hope is that this new show will do something similar when it comes to recalling the events of TNG. I’m given hope for this with the news that Jonathan Del Arco will reprise his role as the Borg drone the TNG crew christened Hugh in “I, Borg” and who was last seen in the “Descent” two-parter. As I stated before, we already have three other TNG regulars confirmed to make appearances. It would be nice if the rest did as well, although hopefully not in a rushed or contrived manner.

One thing I find interesting in the trailer now available is that Seven has a different (more human?) tone of voice than she did on Voyager. That alone makes me wonder how things could play out.

Picard himself is shown as a different person. Having become disenchanted with Starfleet in the years since Nemesis, he now lives out his days in his family’s vineyards in France. That is, until circumstances call upon him to return to Starfleet. In this series, Picard is allied with new characters, played by actors such as Santiago Cabrera, Michelle Hurd, and Alison Pill. I haven’t seen enough footage from the show to make any judgment (positive or otherwise) about these characters yet, but here’s hoping they’re each given a chance to shine, unlike in Discovery, where basically the entire supporting cast has been overshadowed by Sonequa-Martin Green’s Michael Burnham.

This also brings up something else I hope the show will give us: a different dynamic between the regulars. As all the main TNG characters were in Starfleet, it became a matter of getting used to Picard’s command style when they met in the premiere episode “Encounter at Farpoint”. This show, however, is not one in which a ship is assigned to explore the vastness of the galaxy. As a result, any new supporting players, and even Picard himself, should have different outlooks and even different agendas.

From what the trailer shows, Picard himself does go back into space, although the Enterprise herself isn’t mentioned. I have no problem with him being on another ship, but it would be nice if his years on the ship whose name has done Starfleet proud for two centuries would at least be mentioned in passing.

In his review of the third TNG movie Insurrection, SFDebris suggested that the TNG regulars could have potentially locked horns with each other over the life-giving energy that surrounded the planet where the annoying space Amish people lived. That could have really given that film dramatic fireworks, and like Wrath of Khan, it could’ve taken Star Trek into a new direction. As we’re expecting to see Riker, Troi, and even Data in Picard, it would be dramatically fascinating if these characters, who fought side by side with Picard for years, were now finding themselves with interests which conflict with his own.

A continuous storyline would also benefit the series. One aspect of TNG I always thought made that show special was that it had story arcs (perhaps the most famous of these being the Klingon and Borg arcs) alongside standalone tales. Star Trek: Deep Space Nine took the serialization aspect even further, while Voyager, Enterprise, and Discovery all ended up telling it to piss off. But such continuity would serve this new show greatly as it deals with a different Picard than the one we saw in TNG. It could show him slowly but surely returning to the profession he was made for with renewed vigor.

My only hope is that his potential return to the captain’s chair doesn’t simply redo TNG with new supporting players. I’ve heard some criticize the ending of Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, which shows our heroes back in their old positions on a new Enterprise, complete with Kirk being demoted to captain. But the good vibes the film itself generated made this ending pleasing for me. An added bonus was how Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country showed us what transpired during the five years in between the two films. Sulu becomes a captain himself while both the Federation and the Klingons are now being led by individuals who are open to building potential bridges in order to begin a new chapter of peace when circumstances dictate that doing so would be beneficial. The great storyline for that film is set into motion by those on both sides who dread what such diplomatic acts could lead to. In other words, while Kirk and his crew still did some exploring in the years between Voyage Home and Undiscovered Country, there were dynamics that made this period different than the one during the series. Hence, something such as this could work for Picard as well.

As I stated, the new show, like Discovery, is also headed by Kurtzman, who wrote the first two entries of the Trek reboot films. He has stated that the new show will follow the prime universe timeline established by the first movie in the reboot trilogy (the destruction of Romulus, the death of Spock, etc.), for good and for bad as far as I’m concerned. I put it that way because that trilogy, with all its promise of bringing something new to Trek, ended up just being generic action movies that pissed all over the original series. The four TNG films ended up doing the same with that series.

The new show has potential; here’s hoping it doesn’t flush it away.