Georgia Rule‘s opening scene has Lohan walking alongside her mother’s Mercedes as they fight (momma played by Felicity Huffman). The mother and daughter scream at each other through the driver’s side window down a long and lonesome highway. The scene is part humorous, part interesting, and part unintelligible; which is a pretty good description of the movie as a whole. Felicity Huffman pulls off and leaves Lohan in the dusty distance, 20 miles outside of town, just like Georgia Rule leaves us in the plot desert, with logic sand in our face, dreaming of an entertainment oasis. Yipes, that was like a quintuple metaphor. I don’t know why I don’t charge more for this stuff.
Plot time. Lohan is a rebel, and she’ll never ever be any good. She’s a rebel and she never ever does what she should. The reason I joke here is because the film does too. Her rebel ways feel either fake or hilarious, but never genuine. She just seems really screwed up. And with the tagline “In this family, attitude doesn’t skip a generation” they weren’t going for screwed up. They were trying to make her a bad-ass. The effort fails miserably.
Truly Georgia Rule this is a movie about molestation, or an alleged past molestation (no spoilage here). Don’t let the trailers and happy poster fool you, that’s just the marketing team at work. That’s why the whole thing is so distasteful; the movie is trying to make you laugh when it should be presenting serious drama. Unless you find some sort of perverse joy at laughing at a scarred kid you’re going to be very confused by this one at points.
There is some good though, that’s why this is not quite in the D range. There are legitimate funny moments, and the concept itself is decent. Georgia Rule has the framework of a good movie and Lohan does all she can (given the crippling limitations in tone) to deliver a solid performance. I liked Dermot Mulroney more than I’ve ever liked him here so fist bump his way too. Jane Fonda is adequate, but the title “Georgia Rule” comes from her making up arbitrary rules and it’s used for about four seconds of the film. Maybe next time come up with a better, more applicable title fellas. Go the extra mile. Put in the extra fifteen minutes.
This will be pass if you’re looking for something well constructed. It is funny, so if you want the occasional laugh then see it. If you want to see the evolution of an actor in Lohan then give it a watch. If you want to hear her say some crude sexual dialogue then check it out. But this isn’t a complete movie and you shouldn’t head into the theater expecting greatness. Your eight bucks will buy you nothing more than a slight smirk followed by a pained scowl. The plot desert will leave you thirsty for something more substantial.
