Film Review: Veronica Mars
I never liked Veronica Mars while it was on TV. I thought it was lame and unrealistic.
While it's still all those things, I recently got hooked after a couple of marathons on Vibe and found myself looking forward to the film version. MySky is a wonderful thing for crappy television.
Veronica Mars has become somewhat of a cult show in the likes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Alias and that one with Jessica Alba. They all showcase sharp-witted, strong female leads who have broken the mould.
The show was such a hit that creator Rob Thomas and star Kristen Bell launched a fundraising campaign to produce the film through Kickstarter, earning the green light from Warner Bros to make a full length Veronica Mars movie.
The film starts off nine years after the events of the show's final season, where Veronica (Bell) has left Neptune for a law career in New York.
With a job offer on the table, she is drawn back to Neptune after her former boyfriend, Logan (Jason Dohring) is arrested for murder. She is reunited with her father Keith Mars (Enrico Colantoni), Neptune's former sheriff-turned-private investigator, who shows her how corruption and classism is rife under the new Sheriff, Dan Lamb.
Of course there is a love triangle between Veronica, Logan and Piz (Chris Lowell), Veronica's current boyfriend.
The film is pretty much a really long Veronica Mars episode. And that isn't necessarily a bad thing. I enjoyed it. The acting was fine (nothing amazing; these are all TV actors in a movie, remember), there are heaps of cameos (James Franco, Justin Long, Dax Shepard, Eden Sher, to name a few), and plenty of well-known faces to make up the cast, including Martin Starr of Freaks and Geeks fame, Jerry O'Connell, Gaby Hoffman, and Krysten Ritter.
As for the plot. You have to take it with a grain of salt otherwise it's just terrible. Of course the police department is corrupt and idiotic and can arrest Logan with absolutely no evidence.
Of course Veronica can just figure out what happened, right down to every detail, just by putting two pieces of "evidence" together. Of course that would all happen.
If you can just get on board that crazy train, you should be able to enjoy the one liners, the awesome chemistry between Veronica and Logan, the sweet relationship between Veronica and her dad, the rather good action scenes, and even an unexpected moment that made me jump!
Like I said, you have to just get on the bandwagon to be able to enjoy this movie. If you were a fan of the TV series I'm sure you're going to love it. Oh, and fun fact, Kristen Bell is sooo pregnant in the movie and they do really well covering it up.
Score: 4/5
