Movie Review - 'High School Musical 3: Senior Year'

High School Musical 3: Senior Year Starring Zac Efron, Vanessa Hudgens, and Ashley Tisdale Directed by Kenny Ortega Rated G

Certain movies are absolutely immune to criticism. If you were to praise them, it wouldn't mean anything because the audience the film was carefully constructed to reach pays no attention to movie reviews. If you were to lambaste those movies, it wouldn't matter, either, because the audience those reviews are carefully constructed to reach isn't going to see the movies in the first place.So, in more ways than one, I was a fish out of water while watching High School Musical 3: Senior Year.No matter how you came upon this particular review makes no difference; the fact that you have means you have at least heard of Disney's remarkably successful made-for-TV movie series. About all I knew was that it was a squeaky-clean musical set in a high school, and that is, as it turns out, all you need to know. This is in no way a reflection of contemporary high schools. None of the girls are pregnant and we never see a student suspended for smoking weed. Maybe that's a good thing.There are four or five primary characters, by my calculations: Troy (Zac Efron), his girlfriend Gabriella (Vanessa Hudgens), the Disney equivalent of a Mean Girl, Sharpay (Ashley Tisdale), her twin Ryan (Lucas Grabeel), and Troy's friend Chad (Corbin Bleu). They're at crossroads; after all, it's senior year. Troy really wants to go to Julliard, but his father is pushing him to take a basketball scholarship. I'm taking the position that dad is dispensing poor advice on this one. Gabriella wants to go to Stanford, because she's the studious type.None of this is particularly important. The story only strings together musical numbers. I suppose if you're embedding messages to the impressionable younger viewers, there's some garbage about not giving up on your dreams, but it's thin at best. The song and dance numbers, on the other hand, are pretty damn good. I wouldn't exactly call the work of director and choreographer Kenny Ortega groundbreaking, but it's all very polished, entertaining, and creative. I was surprised by how little the songs themselves moved the needle, as you'd expect something so squarely bubblegum to at least offer memorable melodies, but the dance sequences feel like something out of a old Michael Jackson video. It's no wonder this show has caught on with an audience that doesn't care about story structure and character development and just wants to sing and dance. So, really, you have to consider this movie a success - what we're really paying to see is worth paying to see.Of the young cast, I don't see much potential for Tisdale or even Hudgens, who doesn't exhibit very much real emotion or genuine talent. She's like a cuter Hilary Duff. But Zac Efron will be - and, frankly, probably should be - a really big deal. He has all the talent in this cast, and he's a bit of a throwback, really. I'd like to see him outside of a musical, and we'll get that chance a couple times in 2009, but you can't watch this movie, knowing what a phenomenon it is, and not see bigger things ahead for this kid.In the final, albeit useless, analysis, what can I say? The movie was a bit longer than it should've been, but it wasn't excruciating. I've certainly endured much, much worse movies aimed at the youth audience. High School Musical was more spirited than I thought, the musical numbers worked well enough, and those things about it that aren't up to snuff really aren't very important to the film or its audience.

Comments

[ktg46]

I went to see this film and enjoyed it very much. The critic above was right when they said the
plot has little depth, but with that said it was very entertaining, I liked most of the musical numbers. May I have this dance, Boys are Back and Scream being my favorites. It was a pleasure to watch and the time passed quickly. An older Efron fan. I see great potential in this young man. I wish him well.

[bobertdos]

I agree that Efron has more potential than most of his castmates. I fervently hope his next couple projects next year work out, because he is beginning to tread on thin ice in terms of type-casting himself. If he keeps it up much longer, he will be in a precarious career position. That being said, I also wish him the best.

[JD]

High School Musical 3 is definitely what I consider to be one of the most surprising phenomenons of the year. I came across this funny video that apparently spoofs HSM, called Smokin' Weed. I wonder when Weinstein co is going to make a movie spoof out of it? Seems obvious.

http://privatehighmusical.blip.tv/#1396759

[astronomius]

"I enjoy all things Disney" should be my second middle name, since, well, you know... i may agree that HSM3's target audience probably won't read its reviews and see it anyway; i saw it and wrote a 700+ word review the day it came out on a Disney blog site, but it doesn't matter to me too much that it won't be well-read. i agree that the film is successful in that we paid to see a song and dance movie, because the movie is (a little) slim in plot and characterization.

what i hugely disagree with is your poor assessment of Hudgens, Tisdale, Grabeel and Bleu (Reivers), largely because you see so little of them onscreen, and they can act well when they're given bigger roles.

i guarantee you that Efron and Tisdale can easily shine past their scripts, but much of HSM 3 really centers on Zac and Vanessa and there is so much comfort and chemistry between them on and off screen that they will probably go down in movie history as one of the most memorable teen couples onscreen.

also, the writer (Barsocchini) cleverly wove the musical numbers in throughout the story to help tell the story (rather than string all the numbers together as one massive play), as these songs are the final project of the senior Drama class; he saved a lot of screen time doing that.

too bad you didn't see all this.