Fun
Frisky
Nostalgic
Intense
Adventurous
Choked Up
Curious
Romantic
Weird
The King’s Speech? More like The Lord’s Dance. In 2011, Colin Firth took home the Best Actor Oscar for The King’s Speech, a move that I can only imagine was the Academy’s way of honoring him for his exceptional work in the 2003 Amanda Bynes classic What a Girl Wants. Despite its paltry 35% on Rotten Tomatoes, What a Girl Wants is far and away Firth’s best movie, not least because he’s paired with a once-in-a-generation talent like Bynes. Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, eat your heart out.
Dennie Gordon’s take on “The Reluctant Debutante” stars Bynes as Daphne Reynolds, an American teenager living with her single mom in New York City. After watching one too many father-daughter dances at her cater-waiter job, Daphne decides to fly to London to find her father, Lord Henry Dashwood (Firth). At first, Lord Henry Dashwood — this is LONDON, and we shall call him by his PROPER name at all times — doesn’t know what to do with his freewheeling, totally un-royal daughter, but he quickly comes around to her fun-loving nature. If it weren’t for Lord Henry Dashwood’s snobby, self-important fiancée Glynnis (as if it weren’t clear enough that this lady sucks) and her mean girl daughter Clarissa, What a Girl Wants would happily end here.
But alas, dear reader, it does not. What follows is an examination of class, the British political system, parenthood, and Cuckoo Al that rivals any heavy-handed monologue in The King’s Speech. In What a Girl Wants, Firth gets to be more than just a stammering king; he’s a father, a House of Commons candidate, a fiancé, and a man rediscovering the identity he lost many years ago. Plus, he wears leather pants and dances around to “Rock and Roll, Hoochie Koo” by Rick Derringer. God save the… Lord?
If Bynes lends What a Girl Wants its comedy, Firth gives it its heart. It’s impossible to ignore Firth and Bynes’ natural father-daughter chemistry, which is readily apparent even when he’s pushing her to “come out” to society against her best judgement. For the first half of the movie, their relationship is conveyed through small moments — eating cereal in the middle of the night, stolen glances that can only mean, “God, Clarissa is such a butt” — but about an hour in, Firth steps into hardcore dad mode.
After Daphne pushes her douchey suitor into the river, Lord Henry Dashwood rushes to escort her out, stealing her boyfriend’s motorcycle in the process. They speed through the streets of London (in “indecorous” fashion, as he explains later) and then have a heart to heart about her mom on a public swing set. Next, they hit up a flea market, where they get henna tattoos and fill out their record collections (hence the Cuckoo Al). Now a changed man, Henry — he’s just Henry now that he’s cool again — revisits his rock and roll past by donning an earring and his old leather pants, which, can I just say, he fills out splendidly. Apparently, all it takes to go from Lord to DILF is some leather chaps.
Throughout it all, Firth nails the requirements of the empathetic, proud, often-conflicted father. He expertly dishes up the disappointed father look (you know the one), which only gets more dad-like when he becomes upset with himself. Even later, after he’s royally screwed things up at Daphne’s coming out party, he redeems himself: he breaks up with Glynnis on the spot and punches the shit out of her power-hungry father. Firth could have done all this with the functional acting ability of a middling rom-com dad, but instead, he delivered a performance so affecting it’s almost as if he were Bynes’ real father (according to Wikipedia, he is not. Just FYI).
Anyone who says that What a Girl Wants is “uninspired and insipid all the way” or calls it “an execrable and witless nonstarter” is ignoring the fact that Colin Firth goes above and beyond to play a loving, morally complicated father. Just try not to cry when he shows up at Daphne’s final cater-waiter gig on a GONDOLA. Your king could never — but if he did, The King’s Speech would be a much better film.
What a Girl Wants is now available to stream on Hulu.
