CHEERLEADER GONE WILD IN ‘JENNIFER’S BODY’

By Gary McPherson

Diablo Cody won a screenwriting Oscar for ‘Juno’, the story of a high school girl whose life gets turned upside down due to an unexpected pregnancy.

Diablo Cody will not win a screenwriting Oscar for ‘Jennifer’s Body’, the story of a high school girl who becomes possessed by a demon and begins eating her classmates.

And though that might be an ever so brief synopsis of the movie, ‘Jennifer’s Body’ is more than it seems and makes for a fun night out, even for those who are not subscribers to ‘Fangoria’.

Cody’s trademark, quirky dialogue is on display, though not as effervescent as in ‘Juno’. There, the dialogue carried the movie and turned it into the little movie that could.

In ‘Jennifer’s Body’, there is more action, more meat. All the better for the title character to munch on.

Jennifer is played by Megan Fox, who while still not Kate Hepburn (or even Kate Capshaw), shows some more acting chops than she has in any of her previous work. Even she admits that she was awful in ‘Transformers’.

When Jennifer has a little too much to drink, she leaves a bar with the house band, who turn out to be devil worshipers. The lead singer believes Jennifer when she tells him that she is a virgin and we all know nothing is more appealing to Satanists than a virgin.

They plan to use Jennifer as a human sacrifice, but since she lied about her purity, Jennifer becomes possessed, as opposed to just dead.

Girl power reigns supreme as Jennifer goes on a rampage, devouring dudes from her school. And when I say devouring, I literally mean eating them. Pretty gross.

Jennifer’s gal pal Anita starts to realize something is amiss with her BFF, especially after Jennifer keeps showing up places covered in blood. Note to self: if my best friend Bryan repeatedly shows up at my house covered in someone else’s blood, it’s time to reassess our friendship.

Jennifer and Anita have a heart to heart, where Jen explains what happened with the band and her new penchant for flesh. Anita, unwisely, takes it upon herself to stop the carnage, mainly in an attempt to save the life of her boyfriend. Gore ensues, thanks to, among other things, a pool skimmer.

In a genre that has become chockfull of retreads (‘Halloween’) and Japanese remakes (‘The Ring’, ‘Shutter’), it’s nice to see an original horror movie for a change. Especially one that contains a script that doesn’t sound like it was penned by a 13 year old.

Grade: B