I’m sure there aren’t too many who consider 1999’s She’s All That a great film, or even a great high school comedy film, but I know there are fans and I know nobody was clamoring for a Netflix gender-swap remake starring one of Tik Tok’s most famous users. We didn’t need the original but it was a mildly amusing version of My Fair Lady, or its older inspiration Pygmalion, set in the superficial class system of an American education system. It came out during the heyday of 90s teen cinema remaking older literary concepts (Ten Things I Hate About You) and made short-lived careers for stars Freddie Prinze Jr. and Rachel Leigh Cook. My amazement is Netflix rehiring the same writer, R. Lee Fleming Jr., now 50-something, and asking him to remake his twenty-year-old hit for the voice of Generation Z (It’s not even like “all that” has held up in slang parlance). This movie feels every bit the dismal corporate-sponsored, cash-grabbing, star vehicle that it is. Nobody in Generation Z cared about She’s All That, and now very few will really care about He’s All That.

This time we follow Padgett Sawyer played by Tik Tok star Addison Rae (83 million followers in real life!). Padgett is a high school senior who has millions of online followers who hang onto her every word of advice. She uses her position as an influencer to even help pay the bills at home to relieve her overworked mom (Rachel Leigh Cook, not the same character) and maybe pay for her college. She live streams catching her boyfriend cheating, loses her cool, and becomes a meme thanks to an unfortunately timed snot bubble. Now she has to earn back those lost followers and her respect or else she might not still maintain her ascendant social media standing and pay for school. Her catty friend challenges her to makeover a loser guy at school and the hopeless case ends up being Cameron Kweller (Tanner Buchanan), a sarcastic, arty loner who wears a beanie and has long hair (a wig) and rides horses and practices karate. What a loser. She buddies up to Cameron and through that friendship she starts to question her own sense of self and learns what’s really important as she physically changes this guy to be more acceptable to a mainstream opinion of people she’ll never meet in real life. Or something like that.

The inordinate influence of social media is a very worthwhile avenue to explore for modern satire as a means of separating this He’s All That from its predecessor and making it relevant. The problem with He’s All That is that the movie refuses to go very deep or hard-hitting with this topic because it’s also meant to be a vehicle for fame to launch the feature acting career of Rae. I’ll fully admit, dear reader, that I had no idea who Rae was until watching this movie and I don’t really get the appeal (more on her acting ability later). In this movie, Padgett is obsessed with maintaining her carefully curated online image, a ruse that relies upon a fantasy that no human being could adequately maintain. She wakes up and goes through an entire routine of makeup and hair styling before she records herself “just waking up.” It reminded me of a joke from the fabulous TV series The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel where the title character makes sure her husband never fully sees her in the morning how she actually looks. It was funny then because it commented on the pressure of wives in the 1950s, let alone those from Jewish families, to live up to an impossible beauty standard to appeal to the man’s comforts and desires. With He’s All That, it really becomes the last joke at the expense of our main character. The movie is too afraid to delve any deeper for fear of directing negative attention toward its star and her influencer ilk. It even conveniently sets up the good of her position, what with her able to pay some bills. She can’t be all bad, you’ll say, because she’s helping her mom. I guess we like social media facades now.

Padgett’s plight really doesn’t make much sense in the context of the movie. She’s dropped perhaps a fifth of her many followers after the embarrassment of her public breakup with her louche of a boyfriend, a wannabe recording artist. First off, I don’t know why this personal incident would be so detrimental to her character. Her boyfriend was clearly bad, she stood up for herself, and I would think that would only make people like her more and draw more followers to her brand. The only reason she has to worry is because we’ve awkwardly included Kourtney Kardashian and an even bigger social media influencer. I don’t know why we have a Kardashian here, and I don’t know why she doesn’t merely play herself, unless that too would be another example of striking too close to home with the satirical depictions. Regardless, Padgett is worried she’ll have to, gasp, potentially take out student loans for college. She believes that picking someone to grant a makeover would get back lost followers, which makes some sense, but then her friend also elects to make a personal bet about selecting some campus schlub and turning them into a heartthrob. Why does our main character need two motivating forces for why she agrees to participate in this bet? It’s needlessly extra for a movie with so little else going on.

Another fault is that there is no chemistry between our leads, which kills the investment in any romantic comedy. The two actors are not a good fit from the beginning, and this comes down to two factors, the underwritten characterization and the limited acting ability of Rae. It was a joke in Not Another Teen Movie, a not-so-great spoof over those popular 90s/early 2000s teen comedies, that the thing separating the obviously beautiful girl from “plain Jane” territory was merely glasses and a ponytail. Cameron is already an appealing guy so when he gets his big physical transformation it’s really just scrubbing off stubble dust and removing the beanie. His character, a self-described outsider, would be unlikely to be seduced by the wiles of popularity. There’s also precious little to be uncovered with the character of Padgett, so the movie can’t even have Cameron fall for Padgett as he realizes she isn’t like his preconceived notions. There’s no heat or sizzle or any point of intrigue between these two that would compel an audience to root for their eventual coupling. Cameron, we’re told, like “Kurosawa, Kubrick, and kung-fu movies,” and he’s basically the gender reverse of a shallow rendition of a manic pixie dream girl who is ultimately just there to get the protagonist to stop and appreciate life and then sublimate their own interests and desires to that of the protagonist. This is a romance where you root for irrevocable heartbreak.

Rae might be an overall pleasant presence but she’s not quite there in the acting department yet. Her limited range really dampers many of the dramatic moments. Her line readings are extremely monotone. There are moments where I thought she was just going to smile her way through a scene. There were several scenes where I was convinced they could only have filmed two takes because this had to be the best one by default. I don’t want to pile on Rae. I don’t know the woman and she’s only twenty years old and this is only one role. Except He’s All That has also clearly been tailored for her and she cannot live up to these standards at this time. There’s an egregiously long dance battle at the prom that goes on forever just to take advantage of Rae’s dance skills from her Tik Tok dances. It’s the same kind of contortion done to make room for Buchanan’s (Cobra Kai) martial arts skills with a silly fight with Padgett’s ex-boyfriend.

If I was overly cynical, I would estimate that the producers of He’s All That sought an older IP that might still have some pull with an older audience that could be stripped down to its parts and slapped together with a formula that could platform its young stars while also barely hitting that 80-minute feature running time requirement. Except that sounds exactly like what’s happened with He’s All That as well as the preponderance of product placement. This entire movie is a cynical enterprise. It’s not funny at all. It feels completely inauthentic with its portrayal of modern teenagers and social media lifestyles and even the appeal provided by a social media following of fans giving instant validation to every coordinated effort to be your phony best self. The director is Mark Waters, a man who helmed Mean Girls, the 2003 Freaky Friday, and the dark indie comedy The House of Yes. He has talent. He knows how to shoot a comedy. He knows that not every scene needs to be overly lit like night and shadow have no meaning and it all looks so cheap. While watching He’s All That, you’re left with the strong impression that everyone should know better, and you should know better than spending 80 tepid minutes of your time watching this cynical exercise.

Nate’s Grade: D