“Could have been worse” may not seem like praise for any movie, but for the tween-dream Monte Carlo, that's as good as it gets. Any film starring Disney-product Selena Gomez, Gossip Girl’s Leighton Meester, David Cassidy’s daughter, and the hunk from Glee promises to land somewhere in the depths of a sugary-sweet teenage hell where Miley Cyrus rules with a trident and the only heat is a side effect of Bieber fever.
Monte Carlo manages to be a little less painful than that. A case of mistaken identity carries three girls on a lavish European adventure where they find both boys and themselves. But, as bad as it is, this comedy of errors has a little more wit than you'd expect, and it should play well at sleepovers.
With that in mind, here are two truths and a lie: 1) Monte Carlo relies too much on sparkles. 2) Meester’s acting is matched in dreadfulness only by Gomez’ English accent. 3) Monte Carlo follows the tradition of great filmmaking going all the way back to Citizen Kane. Now who wants the first makeover? --Lydia Munnell
