hannah montana: goooo, pop cultural capital! gooooo!

Hannah Montana: the Movie: movie starring miley cyrus AS hannah montana!! or hannah montana as miley cyrus...whoah.

i've never seen the show (i SWEAR! no, i really haven't! don't you trust me?), and perhaps snobbishly, i was surprised by how much i liked this movie. or maybe it's not snobbish, because of the embarrassing amount of experience i've had with disney channel-style joints, from life-size to bratz.... the point is, having had some experience with the TERRIBLE AWESOMENESS that can result from bad bad bad marketed-to-children films, hannah montana: the movie was pretty much legitimately awesome. surprising? possibly. i don't know, because i haven't seen the show (really, i haven't. i really haven't).

first of all, miley cyrus is pretty fantastic. not sure i like her voice, but i really like the way she uses it. or used it in this movie. that's not a damning with faint praise, by the way. as a singer myself (you know, sort of), i think it's much more important how you sing that what you're working with--and that's been proved time and again. callas, for example. or johnny rotten. i like both of those singers better than miley cyrus, but that's a matter of personal taste. don't like most of the songs, but the way she sang "climb" was...good. really good. and i was completely into her acting. i thought all her choices were full of character, personal and original--i felt like she was really present in what she was doing.

not having seen the show (really, i totally haven't), i don't know if that was a product of the product of hannah montana: the franchise, or a product of some combination of the script and direction. again, i'm ABSOLUTELY NOT saying that some uber-talented director managed to draw a performance from miley cyrus that she never would have been able to accomplish without him--i felt like she was totally steering her own boat on the acting end of things. but the performances were pretty universally good, which, again, because i have experience with such things, i am qualified to say, is not always the case with disney-style movies.

allow me to stretch my imagination for a minute and say that what i feel like happened was:
a., the director came upon a quasi-ready-made cast, because of the show being a longstanding sort of thing.
b., the director was like, okay, let's get into these roles!
c., the director was maybe somewhat surprised by what the cast was capable of bringing to their parts.
d., the director was like, "let's go with this. you guys are totally awesome."
does that sound condescending? i don't have as much experience with tween t.v. as i do with tween movies, so it's so very possible i'm totally wrong about the way hannah montana: the t.v. show carries itself. but, like, even the friends of the skateboard girl who blew up the cake had, like, a lot of depth to them--more depth than you'd necessarily find in the beta-female sidekick of the lead girl in a romantic comedy (oh, you know exactly what i'm talking about)--and they only got, like, five minutes of screen time, and i wasn't wild about the stuff they had to do.

maybe it's a t.v.-to-movie thing, when t.v.-to-movie is done right. like serenity. not all of the NINE main characters got as much time as one would have liked (kaylee and simon spring to mind), but there was a certain vibrancy about all of them, perhaps caused by their having had lives previous to the movie.

this also might explain why melora hardin character fell a little flat. usually i freaking ADORE melora hardin (17 again??? totally amazing performance! and that one episode of the office where she and michael go to the party together and she's kind of drunk and talking to the camera and you can see her coming apart at the seams because of the sharp-edged way she laughs--just so good), but in hannah montana: the movie, she didn't seem to be as grounded of a character as the rest of them (even billy ray cyrus, who i liked, but thought was pretty bad as an actor--again, liked what he did, just didn't think it was good acting), and it fell kind of flat. which was too bad. because she's so good.

anyway, i may not go straight to target and buy hannah montana: the sheet set or hannah montana: the waffle iron, but i really liked this movie. it was neat. it gives me faith in this miley cyrus-obsessed next generation. in my day we had britney spears, who was always pretty much a disaster (sorry if this seems harsh; i do root for her personally, and feel like fame has given her a REALLY tough time. but there are two pretty much irrefutable arguments as to her not-so-greatness: "email my heart," and crossroads. though i like her work on how i met your mother. i suppose, like everything, it's a delicate balance). whether or not you think miley cyrus has talent, she has heart, and a spark, which is more than can be said of a whole lot of cultural icons, pop or otherwise (i am talking to you, elvis costello. i am always talking to you. "i don't want to go to chelsea!" bah! get off the train!).

and if she doesn't actually have the heart or the spark, she at least knows the value of faking such things, which, again, is more than can be said for some.

but just to clarify, i personally think that she is talented and she does have heart and spark.

which is surprising in one whose face can be bought on bright pink bathroom towels.

and i think i might go rent the show now.

oh, god, the embarrassing confessions made possible by the interweb.

not sure who might find it ironic that i like hannah montana the movie but not billy eliot, and who might find it typical...and who would agree with me. thank you, by the way, one person in the universe who would agree with me. maybe we'll meet someday.