A Little star is born
LITTLE (PG)
Starring: Marsai Martin, Regina Hall, Issa Rae, Justin Hartley Doesn’t go a long way IF this so-so body-swap comedy was not rated PG — and therefore not targeted so directly at kids — it would score a slightly higher mark.
Surely an M-rating would have been more fitting for a production casually dropping mentions of Tinder, thots and other semi-sexualised slanguage for no particular reason? Take a primary-schooler to
Little, and you are doing them a large disservice.
The movie itself does have an engaging enough premise, and uncovers a talent in its teen star Marsai Martin.
She plays Jordan, the junior incarnation of a 38-year-old corporate executive (Regina Hall) who has been banished back to her 13-year-old self, largely for being such an unpleasant human being.
High school turns out to be both a hellish and healing learning experience for our hard-headed heroine.
Martin’s mimicry of a narcissistic adult off her game is freakishly great at times, particularly as she is playing a shrink-wrapped version of Hall, an acting powerhouse in movies such as Girls Trip and The Hate U Give.
If anything, Martin amplifies Hall’s brusque, no-bulldust persona with a control, accuracy and force that is rarely detected in a performer so young.
Martin, who was 14 at the time of shooting and 13 when she pitched the project to a major studio and is attached as an executive producer, is going to be a significant star in the years ahead.
But once you move away from celebrating the craft of Little’s leading lady, the context in which it appears becomes vexing — such as the scene in which teen Jordan makes sustained suggestive overtures to a teacher in his 30s.
Then there is the matter of adult Jordan’s toy-boy lover, who may or may not be a hired gigolo. He certainly (un)dresses like one.
In its final act, Little settles down into the pleasant teen comedy it should have been all along.
But with a running time of 110 minutes, it may have already worn out its welcome by that point.