The true horror of Jennifer's Body is not Jennifer's boy-eating rampage; it's the dark, painful underbelly of female friendship the film exposes.
It's no accident that every feature film about girls' aggression has been a comedy. To make a real drama about the heartbreak of female intimacy is too dangerous for a culture that trains girls to see relationships with boys as their most important rite of passage.
Which is why Jennifer's Body is so refreshing. Because it's not trying to be a comedy, it actually takes female friendship more seriously than any film has in a long time. "Hell," our narrator tells us in the film's very first line, "is a teenage girl."
Jennifer is the dominant one in the relationship, and "Needy" (short for "Anita" and, hello, long on the heavy-handed) is the classic Good Girl friend. She's quietly compliant and plays by the rules, letting Jennifer have the spotlight. Diablo Cody (Juno writer and general object of teen girl worship) and director Karyn Kusama use mossy flashbacks to let us know the girls' dynamic was forged in the sandbox.
It's no accident that every feature film about girls' aggression has been a comedy. To make a real drama about the heartbreak of female intimacy is too dangerous for a culture that trains girls to see relationships with boys as their most important rite of passage.
Which is why Jennifer's Body is so refreshing. Because it's not trying to be a comedy, it actually takes female friendship more seriously than any film has in a long time. "Hell," our narrator tells us in the film's very first line, "is a teenage girl."
Jennifer is the dominant one in the relationship, and "Needy" (short for "Anita" and, hello, long on the heavy-handed) is the classic Good Girl friend. She's quietly compliant and plays by the rules, letting Jennifer have the spotlight. Diablo Cody (Juno writer and general object of teen girl worship) and director Karyn Kusama use mossy flashbacks to let us know the girls' dynamic was forged in the sandbox.
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