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CROSSROADS (PG-13)

Plot Summary: Just days after graduating from high school, three girlfriends take a road trip to pursue their dreams.

Reason for the Rating: Sexual content and brief teen drinking.

If you have had any exposure to Britney Spears’ music and videos, you’ll know just what to expect from CROSSROADS, as this movie is basically a 90-minute Britney music video.

In her film debut, Spears, plays Lucy, a high school valedictorian who regrets the fact that she never went to football games and dances. She is the daughter of an overbearing, over-protective father (Dan Aykroyd), who has decided Lucy will be going to college to pursue a medical career instead of her love for music. On the night of graduation, she decides to go on a cross-country road trip with Kit (Zoe Saldana) and Mimi (Taryn Manning), her two ex-best girlfriends, and Ben (Anson Mount), a cute guy/ex-con/harmless stranger they’ve just met. (One quick safety tip to all you girls out there: Even though Britney does it, NEVER go on a road trip with a stranger! That's extremely dangerous--and not too smart to boot.)

Each girl has a dream she’s pursuing through this trip. Mimi, who is five months pregnant, wants to audition for a record company in Los Angeles. Kit, the prom queen, wants to see her fiancé who attends UCLA. And Lucy wants to meet her mother, who abandoned her at the age of three. Ben is their driver to LA. His character seems to exist merely to be Lucy’s love interest.

While on the trip these three friends face some heavy issues: date rape, a miscarriage, losing one’s virginity, and the rejection of a parent. It’s not exactly the feel-good, teen-friendly film that the movie studio’s promotional marketing team has made it out to be. In the end everyone’s dreams come true, when Lucy wows the exec’s of the record company with her incredible voice, two amazing back-up singers and a new boyfriend/guitarist.

Unfortunately, CROSSROADS is inconsistent in its message. The movie starts with Lucy dancing in her underwear, followed shortly by another scene with Lucy flashing her male lab partner in sexy…you guessed it…underwear, and an implied sex scene with a guy who looks like he’s 30. Yet, then she’s supposed to be nerdy and innocent. Nerdy girls certainly didn’t look or act like that when I was in high school.

It’s unfortunate that Britney Spears, with her large following of teenage girls, didn’t make a movie that actually supports what she says she’s pursing in real life--abstinence until marriage--and that she doesn’t encourage girls to pursue this with their hearts, minds, and bodies.

FamilyFans.com Recommends: With the heavy topics in this movie being sex, miscarriages, and date rape, CROSSROADS is not appropriate for girls under the age of 13.

After the Show…If members of your family choose to view this movie, use these questions to spark discussion about it afterward:

---What dreams do you hope to pursue? How does a relationship with God figure into those dreams?

---Did this movie correctly portray high school girls? Why or why not?

---What’s the best thing that’s ever happened to you?

Jill Wuellner

Note: All movie-related graphics in this column are standard publicity/promotional shots and are owned by their respective movie studios.