JENNIFER'S BODY

If you thought Megan Fox became famous for her looks instead of her talent, you'll still think that after seeing her in Jennifer's Body. This high school horror movie is an unfortunate mash-up of cliches.

The small town of Devil's Kettle has an unusual pair of best friends: Jennifer Check (Megan Fox) and Anita "Needy" Lesnicky (Amanda Seyfried). Jennifer is a promiscuous cheerleader, popular with all the boys and quick to make a sarcastic comment. Anita is quiet, shy, and ready to do what Jennifer wants. Even Anita's boyfriend Chip (Johnny Simmons) is jealous of how much Anita follows Jennifer around.

Jennifer drags Anita to a dive bar to see the band Bad Shoulder. When the bar burns down, Jennifer and Anita escape -- but then Jennifer goes off with the band in their band. Later that night Anita is home alone when she finds Jennifer there -- bloodied, bruised, and barfing up some sort of black, prickly ichor. The next day in school Jennifer looks and acts fine; in fact, she seems unaffected by the numerous students and townies who died in the fire.

Things then get much worse. Jennifer is killing and eating male students. Anita knows this, between inconvenient psychic flashes during the crime and visions/hallucinations of Jennifer covered in blood and gore. But can Anita stop her best friend, considering how strong Jennifer seems to be?

Anyone hoping for a horror-movie commentary on high school with Jennifer's Body will be disappointed. Instead of going for anything thoughtful or original, the movie settles for prurient ways of showing Megan Fox and horror cliches, from the approaching-from-behind camera angles to the slow motion. So much slow motion... Writer Diablo Cody does a good job capturing how high school students talk, but apart from the occasional sarcastic one-liner there's no dialogue of note. Fox and Seyfried turn in one-note performances as the literal femme fatale and the scared wallflower; the rest of the cast is unimpressive, and the film fails to make any use of terrific actors J.K. Simmons and Amy Sedaris, giving them little more than cameos.

If you're a Megan Fox fan, pick up one of the numerous magazines with pictorials of her instead of sitting through Jennifer's Body. This movie is neither scary nor funny. It's just disappointing.

Overall grade: D-

Reviewed by James Lynch