Episode 19: "Wish Upon a Star"

There are a few things that make the recipe for a great movie in my book.  All I need are the following items: high schoolers, popular girl and nerdy girl switch places, and makeovers.  Give me at least two of those things and I can guarantee you I will love the movie. I can pull out the inner 8 year old in me pretty quickly when it comes to these dumb movies.  I know the whole time that they are not Good Movies, but I enjoy them.  "Wish Upon a Star" includes all of those wonderful items.  I knew Brian would love this movie because of the plot and his favorite actress, Katherine Heigl.

This movie is the classic Disney Channel Original Movie plot with the popular older sister and nerdy younger sister making a wish on a star (duh, check out the title) and they switch places "Freaky Friday" style.  Of course this switch comes at THE worst time.  Poor Popular Sister has been nominated for Homecoming Queen and Nerdy Sister is about to submit her invention for the Science Fair.  I don't want to give TOO much away because I know you were already changing your Netflix Que when you read that this movie involves high schoolers switching places.  I won't completely ruin the movie for you, BUT I will say Popular Sister doesn't win because Regina George steals the crown after recovering from her bus accident.

This is a girly movie all the way through, but it's still a great "I'm home sick and need something on" movie.  In high school and college, this movie made the rotation along with "Clueless" and "10 Things I Hate About You" during every sick day.  Also, these girls wore some rockin' mid 90s outfits that you won't want to miss.

Thank you Mandy for always viewing this winner with me,
Lindsey

Obviously from Lindsey's description you can imagine my great concern going into "Wish Upon a Star."

Strike 1: mid-90s made-for-Disney-channel fluff.
Strike 2: cliche switching places by the two main characters. Seriously, how many times has this been done?
Strike 3: Katherine Heigl. I hate Katherine Heigl. I'm not sure exactly why I hate her, but I do. Maybe it's her insistence on movies that don't appeal to me or other normal humans ("Killers" for example), maybe it's that her character on "Grey's Anatomy" is one of my 10 least favorite characters in the history of TV, maybe it's just that her teeth bother me. Whatever it is, I can't stand her and her presence in a movie almost always makes me want to kick a small dog.

But I must say, as far as mid-90s cliche characters switching places movies starring Katherine Heigl go, this isn't half bad. Not good, you understand. I'm not adding "Wish Upon a Star" to my list of 100 Favorite Movies nor submitting it to AFI for their next rankings extravaganza. But it's not terrible. No small dogs were kicked, there was no gnashing of teeth, and I was able to sit through it with only minimal grunting, though this might be due, in part, to the number of Fruit by the Foots I ingested while viewing. (Fruit by the Feet?) You can't be really upset when eating Fruit by the Foot, can you?

Oh, but we're burying the lead here. Forget Katherine Heigl. The important player in this film is Danielle Harris. Who is Danielle Harris, you ask? Danielle Harris played T.K. Keiner (Harley Keiner's little sister) on "Boy Meets World," the preeminent coming-of-age story of our time. If you don't remember (how dare you!), Cory Matthews dated T.K. for one episode in the pre-Cory and Topanga Forever days of "BMW," ultimately breaking up with her despite threats from Harley. When I recognized T.K. I knew I couldn't hate "Wish Upon a Star" if for no other reason than the fact that it gave me time to ponder the greatness of "BMW" for one more hour of my day than I usually do.

Grade: C+

If only Regina George actually was in this movie,
Brian