Pitch Perfect stars perennially awesome actress Anna Kendrick as Beca, a salty college freshman who’s pissed off that her father has made her go to the local state school rather than move out to L.A. and start her career as a person who professionally mashes other people’s songs together with her Macbook. Her bad attitude gets put to the test, however, when she’s pressured into joining an all-female a cappella group, and actually finds singing in the lame-sounding club to be a rewarding experience that teaches her about friendship, teamwork, and dedication. The movie is basically a Bring It On retread that’s trying to capitalize on the popularity of Glee.
It’s a bit better than that sounds though. There’s more going on here than an inspirational story about a ragtag group of underdogs coming together and beating the evil and unstoppable champions in the final round of whatever. Kay Cannon’s screenplay (based on Mickey Rapkin’s book) has a lot more laughs in it than you usually find in an overtly commercial movie like this. Plus, Kendrick’s always impressive acting is able to take what looks like a well-worn and predictable character arc on paper, and jazz it up a bit with added emotion. Add in a humorous turn by rising star Rebel Wilson (Bridesmaids), and Pitch Perfect reveals itself to be a lot more watchable than you might be expecting.
You still need to be firmly in its target demographic to fully enjoy it though. There’s a lot of positive buzz being built around this movie, and some of it is overstated. While there are a couple good laughs and a couple good performances in here, this is still a movie about a cappella performances, and watching a cappella performances isn’t any fun. As a matter of fact, watching groups of choreographed nerds sing covers of lame pop songs can get downright embarrassing. For a minute or two this felt like it could have been an interesting dramedy set around a college radio station... but then the singing happened. The singing that leads to the tired, predictable, taking-on-the-anonymously-evil-campers-from-Camp-Tigerclaw climax. If you stumble into seeing Pitch Perfect, chances are you won’t be upset that you’re watching it, but, unless you’re a fan of stage singing already (freak), don’t let anybody tell you that you need to go out of your way to see this one.
