Just Friends

This topic contains:

• overall comments and recommendations
• details about Just Friends's classification and consumer advice lines
• a review of Just Friends completed by Young Media Australia (YMA) on 13 February 2006.

Overall comments and recommendations

Just Friends is a poor attempt to show that personality, not body image, is the important factor in a relationship. It fails miserably however and although there could have been some valid messages, they are poorly and confusingly presented. The movie’s gratuitous, slapstick violence and overt sexual references limits its appeal to the older teenage market only.

About the movie

This section contains details about the movie, including its classification by the Office of Film and Literature Classification (OFLC) and the associated consumer advice lines.

YMA review

This review of the movie Just Friends contains the following information:

• a synopsis of the story
• use of violence
• material that may scare children
• product placement
• sexual references
• nudity and sexual activity
• use of substances
• coarse language
• the movie's message

A synopsis of the story

Chris Brander (Ryan Reynolds) is a successful, good looking, music agent. He’s also a good hockey player and all the girls like him. Life wasn’t always like that however for Chris Brander. Ten years prior, he was an overweight, high school geek and the butt of all the school bullies. He was secretly in love with his best friend Jamie Palamino (Amy Smart) but couldn’t bring himself to tell her. After being publicly humiliated at a graduation party, Chris leaves his small hometown of New Jersey and heads for Los Angeles to prove to the world that he’s a ‘somebody’.

Ten years later, Chris lands by accident in his home town, when his current protégé, psychotic ‘wannabee’ pop star, Samantha James (Anna Faris) accidentally sets his private jet on fire while they are on their way to Paris. The plane is diverted to New Jersey where Chris meets up with his Mum (Julie Hagerty), younger brother Mike (Christopher Marquette) and of course Jamie. Jamie is working in a bar while studying at university and she’s very surprised to see the difference in Chris. She is instantly attracted to him but, to her dismay, discovers that he has turned into a not very nice person. Chris seems intent on taking revenge on all of his old foes and his feelings for Jamie are somewhat confused. He still seems to be in love with her but wants to hurt her for previously rejecting him. Meanwhile Samantha seems to think she and Chris are an item and Chris has a rival for Jamie’s attention in Dusty Dinkleman (Chris Klein), another former admirer.

Use of violence

Research shows that children are at risk of learning that violence is an acceptable means of conflict resolution when violence is glamourised, performed by an attractive hero, successful, has few real life consequences, is set in a comic context and / or is mostly perpetrated by male characters with female victims, or by one race against another.

Repeated exposure to violent content can reinforce the message that violence is an acceptable means of conflict resolution. Repeated exposure also increases the risks that children will become desensitised to the use of violence in real life or develop an exaggerated view about the prevalence and likelihood of violence in their own world.

There is a lot of slapstick violence in the movie, including:

• Ted, one of the school bullies, pushes Chris off his bed
  
• Samantha hits Chris in the crotch
  
• Chris and younger brother Mike, are continually fighting, hitting and punching each other
  
• Mike accidentally fires a taser gun at Samantha, causing her to fall over the balcony and injuring herself
  
• Chris spits on Mike
  
• a friendly hockey match that Chris volunteers to play with some children, turns quite ugly. The children hit him with their sticks and Chris retaliates, hitting them quite hard with his stick and punching them. Chris then gets hit in the mouth, full force by the puck, knocking his teeth out. Chris’s mouth is covered in blood and he requires hospitalisation.
  
• Chris kicks Mike while he’s down on the ground
  
• a crowd jeer and hiss at Samantha and starting throwing things at her. She attacks them back with her guitar.
  
• in a rage, Samantha drives her car into Jamie’s parents’ front garden, totally destroying the extensive Christmas decorations.
  
• Jamie hits Chris and shoots him with the taser gun causing him to convulse.

Material that may scare children

Under eight

Children under eight are most likely to be frightened by scary visual images, such as monsters, physical transformations, the death of a parent or child abandoned or separated from parents, children or animals being hurt or threatened and / or natural disasters.

Children under the age of eight could be scared by some of the above mentioned violence, in particular the hockey game.

Aged eight to thirteen

Children aged eight to thirteen are most likely to be frightened by realistic threats and dangers, violence or threat of violence and / or stories in which children are hurt or threatened.

Children in this age group could still be disturbed by the violence, and the total lack of empathy displayed by the main characters.

Over the age of thirteen

Children over the age of thirteen are most likely to be frightened by realistic physical harm or threats, molestation or sexual assault and / or threats from aliens or the occult.

Children over the age of thirteen would probably realise that the violence is intended to be funny.

Product placement

The products Coke and Band Aids are displayed or used in this movie.

Sexual references

There are a lot of sexual references in this movie, including:

• Samantha is shown on a poster licking a chocolate coated banana; she has meringues with cherries on top covering her breasts
  
• Samantha tells Chris she wants to lick his skin off. She rips his pants off and wants to have sex with him
  
• Samantha writes a song about ‘forgiveness’ which includes the line “we can have make up sex”
  
• Samantha is needing sex and goes to Mike to see if he will accommodate her. She starts to undress. She also talks to him about masturbation.
  
• Samantha accuses Jamie of being “the slut he’s been banging behind my back”
  
• Mike asks Chris if he bonked Jamie
  
• Chris tells Jamie he “wouldn’t screw her” and now she knows what it feels like.

Nudity and sexual activity

There is no actual nudity or actual sex but there is some sexual activity including the following:

• Samantha tongue-kisses Chris and her tongue goes everywhere
  
• Samantha kisses another woman on the mouth
  
• Samantha fondles Chris’s crotch
  
• Samantha licks toothpaste over Chris
  
• two men are shown kissing
  
• Chris and Jamie end up in bed together but Chris is unable to have sex with her because he still thinks of her as just a friend.

Use of substances

There’s some drinking of alcohol at a function, and Chris and Ted are shown drinking out of a bottle at a bus stop, getting drunk. Also Samantha is shown apparently high on a tube of toothpaste.

Coarse language

The film contains frequent use of coarse language including the following:

• oh my God
  
• God damn it
  
• Jesus
  
• holy shit
  
• arse
  
• asshole
  
• shit
  
• bitch.

The movie's message

The movie’s message is that a person’s character is more important than body size. However as Jamie ends up loving Chris when he has become more attractive, but not as nice, the message is confused. There are no values or behaviours in this movie that parents are likely to wish to encourage.

Some content of the movie could give parents the opportunity to discuss with their children attitudes and behaviours, and their consequences, such as:

• bullying
  
• violence in sport, including an older man hitting children with a hockey stick.
  
• taking revenge.