A while back I wrote about a movie that told the story of Cinderella in a modern fashion (more of those probably to come). Today I’m doing something similar, but with Snow White instead and in college. Released in 2007, Sydney White took the beloved fairy tale and in my opinion made it a little better. Now it is not the best modern fairy tale movie, but it is still a good watch. Spoilers ahead as always.
Sydney White (Amanda Bynes) is all set to go to college, specifically her late mother’s Alma matter SAU as well as pledge to her mother’s sorority, Kappa. Having been raised by her widowed father Paul (John Schneider) and his construction friends, Sydney is in the eyes of Kappa president, queen bee (another word that starts with b) and the hottest female at SAU Rachel Witchburn (Sara Paxton) “not Kappa material” despite her being a legacy; well that and Rachel’s on/off boyfriend and president of the top fraternity at the school Tyler Prince (Matt Long) likes Sydney shortly after meeting her. Sydney, along with her friend and another Legacy Kappa Demetria Rosemead Hotchkiss aka Dinky (Crystal Hunt) are able to survive the pledging, but because Sydney basically defies Rachel’s ways she is not accepted. Sydney leaves the Kappa house and meets members of The Vortex, a rundown house on campus and home to seven “dorks” at the school. The seven are Lenny (Jack Carpenter) who has a lot of allergies and health problems (he also has a huge crush on Dinky and vice versa), Terrence (Jeremy Howard) a smart post grad who is still there just because, Gurkin (Danny Strong) a blogger with anger issues, George (Arnie Pantoja) the child-like member of the group, Jeremy (Adam Hendershott) the shy one who speaks through a puppet, Embelakbo Akapaktumble aka Embele (Donte Bonner) a foreign exchange student from Nigeria who still suffers jet-lag and “Spanky” (Samm Levine) who despite his “best” efforts has no experience with girls. Sydney and the guys decide that they have to take down Rachel and her tyrannical reign; especially after they find out she wants to destroy the Vortex for a center for only the top Greek sororities and fraternities, by going after the people that Rachel has ignored. Meanwhile as Sydney continues to rank higher and higher on the “hottest” list on the school website, and Tyler and Sydney grow closer, Rachel’s sanity begins to unravel. About as far as I should go without spoiling, but as I’m sure you are aware of the material it is probably not hard to figure out.
As I said before this is not the best modern fairy tale, but I thought it wasn’t too bad. Amanda Bynes was pretty good as the geeky beauty Sydney White. The seven “dorks” are very funny, Matt Long is exceedingly charming, Crystal Hunt was a nice addition as I didn’t know a lot about the character she is based on and Sara Paxton is a real witch as Rachel (and that’s me being nice). There are several references to the original fairy tale and the Disney movie at a few times. If you like the Snow White story, or a fan of Amanda Bynes and the other actors involved than I would say watch Sydney White, otherwise this probably should not be including on a must watch list.
Films or Television Worth Watching 