Demonic possession is appropriate territory for Diablo Cody, a screenwriter whose extremely stylized comedic voice seems to claw its way through each of her film’s characters, lines that are sometimes best ignored, but for the most part, are at least delivered with good cheer.
“Jennifer’s Body,” following the acclaimed “Juno,” is then yet another opportunity for Cody to advance this idiosyncratic approach to dialogue, along with her particular brand of Hollywood Feminist intervention. Paired with female director Karyn Kusama (“Girlfight”), the two set about to turn the notoriously misogynist Slasher genre on its head by first of all, making it clear to everyone what this genre is really about – Jennifer’s body. Although this film is in no way an academic exercise, it will make you question what exactly you think you’re looking at. Think about it this way: Cody wants you to problematize your cake and eat it too. Only in her case, it’s probably a ho-ho.
If you were to poll most teenage boys, Jennifer’s body, as supplied by Megan Fox, is subject enough for a feature film. However, the real focal point of the film is actually Jennifer’s BFF Anita “Needy” Lesnicky, played by Amanda Seyfriend (“Mama Mia”). Take the toxic friend dynamic between Veronica Sawyer and Heather Chandler in Heathers, switch the hair colors, and get them to finally make out and you’ve got something approaching the fucked up bond between Needy and Jennifer. “Sand box love is forever” declares Needy in a voice-over while reflecting on her past with Jennifer. Certainly, it is their romance that is the epic romance of the film, and in many ways its driving narrative force.
Jennifer is her school’s Mean Girl: a stunning, sexually confident cheerleader who nonchalantly packs Diablo Cody’s wit to boost. Needy, with her round-face and angelic looks, projects virginal innocence, but as we quickly learn in the film, is simultaneously courageous and astute. In this casting, Diablo riffs off of the Madonna/whore complex, reworking it in order to reconfigure Needy as the good girl heroine with a twist. Although Jennifer’s sex drive is a primal force within the film, Needy’s own burgeoning sexuality is never ignored either. In fact, there is a scene in the film that explores both of their sex lives through parallel editing: Jennifer’s devouring of their high school’s resident emo-kid and Needy’s own very matter of fact deflowering. Smiling at her boyfriend, she frankly demands that he finally “put it in.” Needy then, is that rare girl from a Slasher film: the girl who enjoys sex and is able to live.
Those who do not make it in this film are strictly men. And Cody seems to have a particular vendetta against those young males of the skinny jean persuasion. The villains of Jennifer’s Body are a gang of indie rock bandmates who make off with Jennifer in their tour van, under the supervision of the lead singer played by Adam Brody. Taking Jennifer into the woods, Brody and his bandmates proceed to stab her repeatedly while doing an a capella version of “867-5309,” as they consult directions for ritual sacrifice printed off of the Internet. In other words, Cody reveals the pure evil at the heart of hipster clichés, by presenting only the most sinister applications of a DIY ethos and a cultivated appreciation for pop gems.
Cody indeed, takes every chance that she can get for cultural critic in this film. Needy, asking Jennifer post demon transformation whether she is perhaps suffering from PMS, gets the response: “PMS isn’t real. It was invented by the boy-run media to make us feel crazy.” Feminist bomb dropped. And who can resist the logic of these words when delivered by Megan Fox’s ripe, blood-sucking mouth?
In the opening sequence of the film, the town’s mysterious waterfall is visually noted upon for audiences, a powerful hole where things are thrown, but nothing is ever spit back out again. It is one of the many metaphors Cody throws into the mix, to convince audiences that the film, like the hole, is probably very deep. And who’s to say it’s not, though “Jennifer’s Body” is an often unruly mess of radical political impulses and the genre’s requisite visual excesses. In short, combine the pure bangability of a creature like Megan Fox with Cody’s earnest Feminist intentions, and you’ve got one heady brew of freaky-fun, determinedly revisionist cinema. Come see this film if you like hot chicks saying stuff written for them by other hot, smart chicks.