SNOW White joins a sorority and gets some “Revenge of the Nerds” friends in “Sydney White,” a cute comedy for girls.
As she did in this summer’s “Hairspray,” Amanda Bynes makes a winsome loser playing Sydney, a college freshman whose mother died, leaving her proud dad (ex-Duke of Hazzard John Schneider) to raise her amid construction workers. Sydney misses her mom – who, with her dying breath, wrote her a long letter telling her about the important things in life, such as which sorority to rush.
The witch/bitch is Rachel Witchburn (Sara Paxton), the president of the sorority who gazes into her computer screen (with the power off, it’s kinda like a mirror) to check her Hot or Not rating. It deems her the fairest in the land.
Sydney signs up for the sorority as a legacy, but she’s the only nonblonde in sight, and the other proto-Witherspoons at Kappa Phi Nu seem unhappy, prissy, snarky, sneery, wrathful, moody and picky. In the hazing process, Witchburn checks the other girls’ pores under a magnifying glass.
Witchburn has devised a 20-year plan centered on marriage to frat boy Tyler Prince. But he likes the unpretentious Sydney – even when she gets
cast out of the sorority and exiled to off-campus overflow housing with seven dorks and their comprehensive collection of “Star Wars” memorabilia.
“It’s a haven for bed-wetters,” explains one geek. “Some of us wet the hallway.”
A clever script by Chad Gomez Creasey works in the poisoned apple, the seven dwarfs’ marching song and a pile of other witty “Snow White” gags. Sleepy, for instance, is an exchange student and poli-sci genius who is perpetually jet-lagged. When Sydney meets a guy who is forever sneezing, she asks, “What are you doing?” Says he, “Waiting for an antihistamine to take effect.”
Bashful speaks only through a sock puppet, and Grumpy, of course, is a blogger: “Try any funny stuff, and I will unleash the power of the Internet on you!” Quite possibly this is the first fairy tale (or tweener comedy) to mention Peyton Manning.
The pace is sluggish for a kids’ movie, though – 15 minutes could easily have been trimmed – and the story jogs rather than speeds to an end. A parody that stretches the length of an entire movie can make for a restless sit, but after a magical transformation to home video, “Sydney White” is destined to enchant the slumber parties.
SYDNEY WHITE
** 1/2
Friendly fairy tale.
Running time: 110 minutes. Rated PG-13 (profanity, mild crude humor). At the 84th Street, the Orpheum, the Kips Bay, others.