Stevecorp Don't listen to the negative reviews

Lightdeossk Captivating movie !

Contentar Best movie of this year hands down!

Comwayon A Disappointing Continuation

SnoopyStyle Halley Martin (Mandy Moore) is a high school student disillusioned with love. She rolls her eyes at her sister Ashley getting married. Her mother Lydia (Allison Janney) is unhappily divorced from her DJ father (Peter Gallagher) who is getting remarried. Her best friend Scarlett Smith (Alexandra Holden) is happily in love until her boyfriend Michael suddenly dies. She's reluctantly to love until Macon Forrester (Trent Ford) finally breaks down her defenses. Scarlett finds out that she's pregnant. Lydia starts dating Steve Beckwith (Dylan Baker).This starts off as a pretty lame teen rom-com. When it takes an unexpected turn, the movie feels like it's ready to make a honest effort. It keeps trying but the lame teen rom-com continues to reappear. Trent Ford is not capable enough to be the lead. Mandy Moore needs a better partner who is deeper than some floppy hair. It's a struggle between a quirky indie and a more traditional teen movie. There is enough to make a passable movie. Allison Janney is a fun presence. The movie takes a few too many melodramatic turns. It doesn't all work but enough of it does.

colieigit This movie is so very real. Real life! Mandy Moore does a good job of playing an angry teen. As you watch it You see things through her eyes. The balance between humor and life's hard times is perfect. I would recommend it. If does deal with issues that are adult or older teen. so PG-13 is a good rating. Again I just want to say how blown away I was by this simple movie. It is so under appreciated and unnoticed. I read the two books it was based on. They are pretty good and also deal with real issues. Some of which are in the film, but the movie blows both books away by far. I love the grandma! Halley (Moore) is not only named after here grandma but has her humor.

murtha_schurm A tragic death, a tragic teen pregnancy, a tragic car accident,a tragic divorce, a tragic broken up engagement...sigh...sob... the circle of life...Will Mandy Moore ever believe in love?Much like Julia Roberts in Steel Magnolias, Mandy also gets an awful boy haircut and maintains her vulnerable but compassionate spirit despite all of womanhood's trials and tribulations surrounding her at every turn- through the guise of her caricaturishly naive and impossibly flat-haired pregnant friend, her sister who has a dwarf's build (no neck, huge head)and does the worst-ever portrayal of a drunken bachelorette, and her constipated-looking crone of a mother who got dumped for a younger woman who dresses badly.Mandy struggles with her own feelings for a boy who has the more feminine version of her haircut, she does some gratuitous yoga poses, drinks alcohol? out of chocolates, watches "Star Wars" and tries "to deal" with her ridiculously satanic-looking DJ dad.Don't worry; it ends with a wedding AND a birth AND a first kiss (and you knew that the timing would work out that way; so predictable).Aww...the circle of life... then close in on all the characters making stupid googly eyes at the new baby.

Shawn Watson New Line has sold this movie short and filed it as a Romantic Comedy but I must stress it is not. It's a teen drama with some romance and humor. Think of it as a teen version of American Beauty. Though it's all rather light, How to Deal does have some seriousness and important parts.Mandy Moore (marry me?) is Halley Martin, a teenage girl who refuses to believe that true love exists (like me). Her best pal does but is heartbroken when her boyfriend drops dead on the football field of a heart defect (err...like me). Halley's parents have split and found others, her sister is engaged to some guy and all they do is argue. It seems like the best way to deal with love is to avoid it.All that changes when Halley meets Macon (stupid name) a geeky Star Wars nerd. He seems like a dweeb at first but his character grows on you, as he does Halley. He's played by Trent Ford and on the cover he's wearing a white vest and is marketed as a sexually neutral, non-threatening pretty boy (Orlando Bloom, Justin Timberlake etc) but that ain't him or his character at all and he never appears in a vest at any point in the movie. I expected to hate him just because of the cover but that ain't so. In the course of her steadily strengthening relationship with Macom (really, what a stupid name!) Halley learns how to deal with teen pregnancy, being a bridesmaid, her dope-smoking grandmother, car crashes, stepmoms, stepdads etc. Stuff that every kid learns. Real kids, not the kids that make love to pastries or live in mansions, which are the only 2 types of kids Hollywood thinks exist.Taken from 2 separate novels by Sarah Dessen called 'Someone Like You' and 'That Summer' it's possible that How to Deal might have a sequel. And if it does its literary roots guarantee it will a better sequel than most.I recommend How to Deal for anyone who is sick to death of endless American Pie clones or Harold and Kumar or Maid in Manhatten/Laws of Attraction/Two Weeks Notice/Sweet Home Alabama/blah blah blah. It's not a romantic comedy, not by a long shot. It's far more realistic than that and it doesn't insult your intelligence. Give it a go.The DVD is in great-looking 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen with Dolby 5.1 sound. The extras are actually quite good for a change, one of them focusing on Young Adult Literature and it's definitely a good DVD for the price.