English 379
March 12, 2013

In the movie easy A, a teen comedy, the main character Olive is initially presented to the viewers as the virginal and feminine high school student who dresses like the average high school student, mostly in pants, and turns out to be transformed into the sex object/pin-up girl to resemble her counterparts in the movie. One being her best friend Rhi and the other Marianne, both whom which throughout the entire movie are always in very short skirts and/or extremely revealing tops, especially Rhiannon. Nonetheless, the one normal, dressing female in the movie, Olive, is then in turn forced and presented as a skank, a whore, and a home wrecker. Although one of the central themes of the movie is the loss of virginity, there are no sex scenes and it does displays a witty, contemporary, modern day spin on Nathaniel Hawthorne's classic novel, The Scarlet Letter. Moreover, the message depicted throughout the movie is that an innocent, little white lie can get blown out of proportion and that teenagers in general are concerned of how others perceive them in their day to day lives.

The movie starts off with Olive being portrayed as a virginal, down to earth, average high school student with no cares in the world but is hastily transformed into the slutty female character very commonly used throughout Hollywood films to depict females nowadays. When a little white lie about losing her virginity meant for her best friends ears only gets out of hand and spreads across campus like wild fire, Olive's persona is transformed into the school whore and is labeled as "easy". With that, her quiet innocent life is altered and takes a turn for the worse. Even though this is just another teen movie representing Hollywood and strictly for entertainment purposes, sadly a lot of teens are effected by how media represents teenagers, especially girls in movies. "Research examining the effects of media exposure demonstrates that media consumption has a measurable influence on people's perceptions of the real world, and, regardless of the accuracy of these perceptions, they are used to help guide subsequent attitudes, judgments, and actions." (131).

When Olives' reputation is on the line with the entire school believing this vicious rumor, she naturally, in turn counts on her best friend Rhi (Rhiannon) to help cope with the lies and situation that has outrageously gotten out of hand. Ultimately and sadly however her BFF gets sucked in with all the hype and eventually joins the other students into trying to rid the school of the newly proclaimed skank and whore representing their school. Since representation of a true female friendship in Hollywood movies is rare and most often demonstrates that two females cannot truly be friends without an underlying cause. In this case, since initially Rhi was the popular and likable character and was the one getting all the attention by representing the pin-up girl/sex object by way of her character being represented by her provocative wardrobe she gets jealous and cannot handle her emotions, so in turn becomes Olives' frenemy. Her once trusted confidant now has become an enemy. Rhi not wanting to be left out of the "in" crowd starts to believe all the rumors and in turn betrays Olive. In addition to this being just a movie, these representations of teenagers, especially women does in pact and send a message to many adults of teenagers in general. “They also are likely to be influenced by images of teens they encounter in theaters, on television, in magazines, and on the Internet. Indeed, the mass media provide consumers with a wealth of information about various social groups’ behaviors, attitudes, and roles. Just as media have been shown to play a role in generating and promoting cultural messages about a host of other subpopulations (e.g., minorities, older people, women), they are also likely to reflect and shape popular conceptions of teenagers.” (24).

What it all boils down to at the end is the boy crush Olive has had since she was 7 years old. Who from day one never believed the vicious rumors being told about Olive. Like typical Hollywood, he happens to pop up at the right place, at the right time to have Olive confide in him and have him help her overcome and conquer the little white lie that so absurdly got out of hand. He helps her out with setting the whole school straight about all the rumors and has everyone tune into her video blog that sets the record straight and truth prevails. This translates Olives' character to a typical female needing a male to make her happy in life and help forget about her worries.

In conclusion, this movie fits the basic stereotypical representation of a lot of misconceptions regarding teenagers and life, portraying Olive as the movies protagonist in typical fashion. First, representing her as the virginal female character, then in turn turning her into the project girl turned sex object/pin-up, and then the princess with having her own price charming coming to her rescue riding a white horse (in this case a lawn mower!) “While media’s messages are often inconsistent and conflicting, they are an important component in the construction and reconstruction of sexualities for young people (Arnett 1995; Martin 1996; Mazzarella and Pecora 1999). Popular media, produced largely by adults, convey the cultural scripts for a variety of social norms, including norms of gender and of sexualities. However, very often missing from the media, and scholars’ analyses of media, is clear and meaningful attention to teen girls’ experiences with and around sexual desire.” (322). A lot of youth today perceive what is meant to be entertainment as reality and proceed to, at times, live their lives similar to what they see on the big screen. How they are perceived by others is an important focus in a teens life and these movies, though are a great distraction, make life seem one sided. That when faced with a problem, they will always find that happy ending with their very own prince charming ready to come sweep them off their feet and sadly reality isn't always so. Life comes with plenty ups and downs and not everything is always sugar coated.

Work Cited

Behm-Morawitz, Elizabeth, and Dana E. Mastro. "Mean Girls? The Influence Of Gender Portrayals In Teen Movies On Emerging Adults' Gender-Based Attitudes And Beliefs." Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly 85.1 (2008): 131-146. Academic Search Premier. Web. 12 Mar. 2013.

Benshoff, Harry M, and Sean Griffin. "American On Film" Wiley-Blackwell, 2009, 2nd ed.

easy A. Dir. Will Gluck. Perf. Emma Stone. 2010. Screen Gems, 2010. DVD

Smith, Sarah. "Scripting Sexual Desire: Cultural Scenarios Of Teen Girls' Sexual Desire In Popular Films, 2000-2009." Sexuality & Culture 16.3 (2012): 321-341. Academic Search Premier. Web. 12 Mar. 2013.

Stern, Susannah R. "Self-Absorbed, Dangerous, And Disengaged: What Popular Films Tell Us About Teenagers." Mass Communication & Society 8.1 (2005): 23-38. Academic Search Premier. Web. 12 Mar. 2013.