John Tucker Must Die
"John Tucker Must Die" is so named because three high school girls, all of whom the title jock (Jesse Metcalfe) has been dating simultaneously, unite for revenge. The movie, however, is not a teen redo of ``The Witches of Eastwick" (but there's an idea). This is a cuter bit of business. Badly made and written, with acting that's been done better on reality television shows, the film needs some of Jack Nicholson's devilish charm. Instead, we get Metcalfe, the lusty lawnmower boy from ``Desperate Housewives," a dreamboat with no sails.
The movie is as inconsequentially pleasant as its star, and far nicer than the title lets on, too. Discovering that they're being played, John's paramours -- the cheerleader (Ashanti), the randy eco-activist (Sophia Bush), and the rigid overachiever (Arielle Kebbel) -- don't actually try to kill their ex-boyfriend. They wage a campaign to make him less popular. (I suppose ``John Tucker Must Be Humiliated" just doesn't have the same ring.) Still, the plot to assassinate his character is futile, since the kid turns out to be socially bulletproof. In one botched prank, he even gives herpes a good name.
When plan A fails, the movie manages to stir some interest. The exes enlist the New Girl, Kate (Brittany Snow), to win John's heart, then break it. Kate, of course, is a virginal, serious student whose cynicism toward men feels true even if the family dynamic that inspired it doesn't. John Tucker reminds Kate of her mother's ex-boyfriends. (Alas, Jenny McCarthy plays the Slutty Itinerant Mom.)
Gradually, the girls teach inexperienced Kate in the ways of cruelty and seduction (cue the Instructional Girl-on-Girl Kiss), and they have a surprisingly good time punking their ex. But Kate turns conflicted about the scheme when John's younger, somehow dreamier, brother (Penn Badgley) develops a crush on her.
But Snow, who was so unconvincing as the good girl desperate to be bad on NBC's ``American Dreams," gives her wide-eyed perkiness the bite a movie this innocuous needs: She's the one person you don't have to fight yourself to like.
Obviously, the plot against the cad is a gimmick, but there's a conviction guiding it that anyone can relate to: Who hasn't wanted to demoralize an old boyfriend by making him wear a thong then tricking him into her coach's hotel bed? That cheerful contempt fuels the first hour.
But then the movie transforms into an altogether more valuable lesson about priorities: boys are stupid, and you'll never be able to deprogram their fundamental roving nature anyway, so, girls, let's just be friends. This, actually, is the rare teen movie to find boys a dim clan of insecure conformists. The 1999 Melissa Joan Hart-Adrian Grenier team-up, ``Drive Me Crazy," and 2004's ``Mean Girls" were similarly perplexed. ``John Tucker" is more explicit about its moral.
I just wish there were more professionalism behind it. Veteran director Betty Thomas (``Private Parts," ``Doctor Doolittle," ``28 Days," ``I Spy") has yet to meet a movie she couldn't make inert and unsightly. This one is like watching 100 minutes of acne.
Wesley Morris can be reached at wmorris@globe.com.
Video
