Stupid For You

Stupid For You is a queer high school romcom with a side of musical. Specifically, the music in the film is inspired by the 90s punk Riot Grrrl movement. Stupid For You also has Riot Grrrl’s inclusive DIY spirit. However, this puts it at odds with the cliche, sitcom-esque plot. Stupid For You’s reliance on cliches makes this a love letter to the Riot Grrrl movement without any of that movement’s edge or danger.

The film focuses on teenage Kat. Kat has a crush on the popular bad girl at her school, Eden. Eden is a huge fan of the 90s Riot Grrrl band, Polyamorous Diatribe. It’s Eden’s goal to reform the band and have them perform at the school’s spring dance. This provides both problem and solution for Kat. Her mom was the lead singer of Polyamorous Diatribe. So, she has the inside scoop. But it also puts her in the strange position of dating a girl who stans her mom. As the spring dance draws nearer, Eden increasingly takes Kat for granted. Their relationship also impacts Kat’s relationship with her best friend, Stevie. And Stevie clearly feels more than just friendship towards Kat.

Stupid For You mines a lot of comedy from awkwardness. Both Kat and her mother are incapable of responding normally to someone they’re attracted to. While this is a good starting point for comedy, it often feels one note. Much of the humour here is just asking the audience to laugh at characters embarrassing themselves. Personally, it just made me want to turn away in empathetic shame. The film knows its characters, especially its younger ones can be cringe. But it then fails to develop them much farther beyond the cringe. Kat has few positive traits because she has few traits overall. I’m unsure exactly what Eden saw in her before she realized Kat had connections to her favourite band.

Eden gets absolutely done dirty by this movie. While Kat is crushing on her, she’s a cool dream girl. When they start dating, she immediately pivots to nightmare girl. Eden starts out as a rebellious punk. By the end of the film, she’s got an entourage and increasing similarities to the mean popular girl archetype. Eden doesn’t get sympathetic or positive traits. She just gets worse as the film goes on. Stupid For You doesn’t want you to root for Eden and Kat, you see. It wants you to root for Kat and Stevie. But instead of developing Kat and Stevie’s relationship or making Stevie look better, they choose to make Eden look worse. This is disappointing writing and shows a lack of confidence. If Kat and Stevie’s relationship was actually good and developed, they wouldn’t have to spend so much time ensuring the audience knew that Eden sucked.

In general, none of these characters are fleshed out. They have few traits and their actions are performed to move the plot along. There’s no insight into any of these characters. I don’t think they’ll be relatable to anyone beyond a surface level either. Stupid For You is beholden to classic romcom cliches. Many of these cliches are foolish and unrealistic. But Stupid For You is very committed to them. This is at the detriment to their characters. Everyone in this movie feels like a stock character you’ve seen time and time again. Maybe it’s slightly different because this time, they’re queer. But even then, I’ve seen enough shallow, gay romcoms where even that isn’t new.

This reliance on cliche is what really tanks Stupid For You. This is a movie about unabashedly queer teens who wear political buttons and perform rock songs. But it feels so safe, tame and mainstream. Particularly because there’s punk influence, that’s disappointing to see. Stupid For You can’t find a balance between the the earnest righteousness of punk, and the lighthearted irony of camp. It tries its hand at both but it’s completely overshadowed by its pedestrian story. Punk and camp both have strong roots in counter-culture. But Stupid For You feels like it has aspirations of being mainstream culture. There’s a place for queer narratives that do try and mainstream queer stories. But it’s disappointing to see in one that has such inspiration from punk.

Stupid For You is a film that I root for in the abstract. But the finished product is far too uneven. The jokes aren’t funny enough and the romance feels rushed and assumed. Kat and Stevie hardly get their romantic moment. We get a montage of scene we’ve already seen of them, a love confession and the credits roll right as they kiss. The film deals too heavily in cliche and seems completely uninterested in subverting it. Because there’s an overlay of Riot Grrrl punk aesthetics, this makes Stupid For You’s unexplored, generic plots and characters all the more disappointing.

Overall rating: 4.2/10

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