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My friend Garth and I have had a furious argument this past week over what is really a rather innocuous movie. Josie and the Pussycats, a film version of the long-forgotten comic book characters, burst into theaters last week hoping to hook teenage girls with another version of girl power. Garth thought the film was brilliant and exuberant, while at the same time offering a savage satire on corporate America's attempt to co-opt the youth of America. I sat on the other end of the teeter-totter, finding Josie to be fairly mindless drivel with its supposed message seriously compromised by the film's marketing and merchandising campaign.

In case you don't remember the old Archie comics (are they still making them?), Josie and the Pussycats were three girls with their own band. They'd play every once in a while, but their real purpose seemed to be to walk around in slinky cat costumes. In the movie, the girls--Josie, Melody, and Valerie--are still slinky though somewhat less feline.

They do play in a band, however; and in a plot development not worthy of explication, they are somehow plucked from the obscurity of Riverdale and made over into mega-stars. The marketing genius behind this transformation is Wyatt Frame (Alan Cumming), who uses the mass media and (get this!) subliminal messages to trick our nation's youth into putting Josie on the Billboard charts (with a bullet).

Wyatt's hope is not only to sell millions of records but also take over the world. Or something like that. His partner in crime is Fiona (Parker Posey, House of Yes), the CEO of MegaRecords, who has an obsession with subliminal messages and their ability to sell worthless products. Along the way, the two try to break up the band so that Josie can be the focal point of the merchandising, a plot "twist" that sets up the film's ridiculous "friends first" message.

I gotta point out that Josie does have some redeeming qualities. The first ten minutes are a truly savage satire on the various boy bands currently polluting our planet. Furthermore, Alan Cumming (Spy Kids) is quite good, making him two for two this spring. And Rachael Leigh Cook confirms her place as one of Hollywood's resident cuties. She takes everything that made her wonderful in She's All That and transfers it effortlessly to the role of Josie (the awkward dis-ease with the world around her is soooo attractive). Finally, despite my better judgment, I found the Pussycats' version of power-pop to be strangely "infectious" (I think that's the word the publicists will use).

Nonetheless, this is not a good film and, despite its attempts to deflect us with an anti-consumerist message, one that feels just as corporate as the MTv schlock it's supposedly satirizing. What plot there is, is completely predictable. There is absolutely no character development whatsoever. Valerie's (Rosario Dawson, Down to You) brooding jealousy is as monotonous a song as Melody's (Tara Reid, American Pie) ditziness. It's as if the filmmakers bought into their own storyline and felt that Josie was the only worthwhile character. The movie's love story will be mocked even by its target audience of 12-year-old girls. The flick does have some nice visual moments, but the final concert is embarrassing. The "stadium" the girls are supposedly playing in looks like a few dozen people with some bad CGI effects and even worse sound editing. And the messages of "friends first" and "think for yourself" are so baldly conveyed I was cringing.

Even more troubling, though, is that Josie might be one of the most merchandised films of the last year, one that probably expects to make more money from all its ancillary affairs than from the actual film. The movie tries to undercut all that by making fun of product placement, materialism, and MTv itself. But I don't have much respect for that winking sort of self-referential sarcasm, particularly when that's become the touchstone of marketing to teenagers. Advertisers know they can't just throw out the product anymore; kids are too savvy for that. Instead, they wrap it up in an anti-consumerist message and hope to disarm the teens' natural cynicism.

Why else would Carson Daly and MTv let themselves be parodied that way? Do we actually think MTv's going to see the error of their ways from Josie ("no, we won't market overpriced beauty products anymore, or clothes that appeal to teenagers' insecurities")? Hardly. For them, it's a way to appear hip and trendy, all the while furthering their own ubiquity.

In the end, I suspect the only (subliminal) message the film's target audience will take away is that fashionable girls don't need to wear a bra. Now that's a perky message we can all support. 

J. Robert Parks 4/21/2001