(What was that about a thin line between love and hate?)
CAST: Julia Stiles, Heath Ledger, Larisa Oleynik, Joseph Gordon Levitt, Larry Miller, David Krumholtz, Andrew Keegan, Gabrielle Union, Susan May Pratt, Daryl Mitchell.
DIRECTOR: Gil Junger
WARNING: Some SPOILERS and surprisingly potent Shakesperean high school shit - straight ahead…
You know how you can tell a writer is truly influential? When his stuff is being recycled even 520 years after it was published. Such is the case with The Bard, AKA William Shakespeare, whose output is like the literary equivalent of a Timex watch or the Energizer Bunny. As in “Take a beating, keeps on ticking” or “Still Going!”
One of the more popular (or notorious, depending on who you ask) modern riffs on the Sharkesperean oeuvre is our latest review: 10 THINGS I HATE ABOUT YOU. Basically a high school version of “The Taming of the Shrew”, this flick revolves around Tacoma, WA sisters Katarina “Kat” Stratford (Julia Stiles) and Bianca “Airhead” Stratford (Larisa Oleynik), and the gaggle of dudes who drift through their orbit like runaway asteroids.
See, turns out Kat and Airhead’s, er, Kat and Bianca’s uptight physician Dad (Larry Miller) is the Grand High Poobah of Overprotective Fathers. This guy makes Bill Engvall look like a permissive and enabling bohemian. Basically, there’s a greater chance of the school mascot scoring a date than the Stratford sisters. See, Pops has this one rule: Bianca cannot date until Kat dates.
What’s the problem? Since Kat is played by looker Julia Stiles? Who wouldn’t want to go out with her, right? Well, Kat may be a hottie, but she’s also a Grade A Ice Princess With A Laser Tongue Capable of Lacerating A Male Ego From Ten Miles Away. In other words, get ready for a celibate teenager period, Bianca. Which is exactly what is in store for her - unless someone can force a male from somewhere within the Western Hemisphere to date Kat. In other words, good luck with that.
But one thing you can count on in this life is that a horny male will find a way. And the horny male (actually, there are several) who hatches a plan to get Kat a boy toy so he can get to Bianca is Cameron (Joseph Gordon Levitt). Cameron is a new student at the school, and get the 411 about the Stratford sisters and their whole fucked-up mythos from geek Michael (David Krumholtz). Realizing he’ll never get to Bianca if Kat goes on being a shrew, Cameron enlists Michael in a plot to find a patsy to tame her.
Cameron and Michael end up approaching colossal tool Joey (Andrew Keegan), some sort of sock model (really) who also likes Bianca, and manipulate him into using some of that easily-earned modeling money to pay bad boy Patrick (Heath Ledger) to do the unthinkable and unspeakable: woo Kat. Cameron thinks that will open the door for him to squire Bianca around. Unfortunately, he underestimates Joey, who thinks his cash entitles him to the same Bianca Benefits, and is just as horny for some Stratford lovin’.
And so Patrick goes headfirst into the proverbial deep end. To say that his work is cut out for him wouldn’t be so much an understatement as it is a foregone conclusion - right up there with “if you step into oncoming traffic you will die” or “if you jump into the middle of a shark feeding frenzy you will die.” Of course, a death at the hands of oncoming traffic and ravenous sharks is probably preferrable to dying at the feet of Katarina Stratford.
Will Patrick succeed in taming Kat? Or will she eat him alive? Is she really attracted to him? Are all those sarcastic barbs really a sign of affection? Or does she truly despise him? And how long can Patrick take this treatment from her before he finds another chick who’s less of a “heinous bitch?” At this rate, will Bianca ever get to date?
Put it to you this way: if someone who looks like Heath Ledger can’t melt the cold heart of Katarina Stratford, well, she’s gotta be batting for the other team. In which case, we may need a cheerleader who looks like Christy Turlington to take over the job from Patrick.
BUT, SERIOUSLY: Smart, sharp, and sincere in all the right dosed, 10 THINGS I HATE ABOUT YOU has got to be one of the most enjoyable of the modern Shakespeare adaptations. Blessed with a cast that is just as talented as it is attractive, as well as a script that unleashes an avalanche of quotable zingers, this movie was pretty much destined for success.
Julia Stiles is perfect as Kat, the “Ice Princess Who Melts.” The character never becomes a cliché in her hands, because she’s just as believable when she’s vulnerable, as she is when she’s formidable. Watching Patrick slowly dismantle her defenses, one after the other, is 10 THINGS I HATE ABOUT YOU’s primary pleasure. Speaking of Patrick, Heath Ledger turns him into one of the better male leads in a youth-oriented movie from the 90’s. Hard and soft in all the right places, it’s not hard to see why this role catapulted Ledger into greater attention. Watching his performance now after his tragic passing a few years ago is a poignant reminder of how much talent Heath Ledger had - and what a huge loss his death was to the art of cinema.
The rest of the roles are all vividly played and ideally cast. Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Larisa Oleynik, Andrew Keegan, David Krumholtz, Gabrielle Union, and Daryl Mitchell would use this film as a springboard to other projects that similarly highlight their considerable skills. And as Kat and Bianca’s uptight Dad, Larry Miller is a hoot.
All in all, 10 THINGS I HATE ABOUT YOU not only succeeds as an offbeat interpretation of William Shakespeare’s “The Taming of the Shrew”, but also as way-smarter-than-average teen comedy. In other words, it’s one in a million.
