Tall Girl: Standing tall, metaphorically too

Manpriya Singh 

Blending in for a high-schooler is as important as…well, blending in the dough for a baker or colours for a make-up artist. It’s the time when you don’t want to stand out even if that means standing tall, and thus head and shoulders above the rest. Meet Jodi Kreyman (played by Ava Michelle), who no matter how much she slouches, will always be the tallest girl in high school, regrettably that is. Her frame comprising 6 foot 1 inch means she is never missed out while walking in the school corridors. And by now is used to remarks like, “Hey, how’s the weather up there?”  What starts at high-school doesn’t end there. It was probably given a head-start back at home when her being four feet at the age of three became an immense concern for the father. “Doctor, it’s just not stopping, can we do something?”

Like with all complexes, till she says enough is enough, opens her ponytail, dons a red lip colour and thus, first masks and later faces her insecurities. Boy, we can never have enough of such teen predicaments where the insecurities and complexes range from being petite to pimpled to even tall. That is the count on which the film scores. 

What the plot lacks in terms of being predictable makes up in terms of treatment. What the characters lack in terms of being clichéd, make up in terms of dialogues. So there’s the guy who has been friend-zoned, an elder sister always winning beauty pageants, a typical high-school mean girl and a heartthrob Stig Mohlin (played by Luke Eisner) who falls for our heroine. 

 “Maybe, a tall guy is being great but when you are a tall girl?” says Jodi to her crush and heartthrob of the school, the Swedish exchange student.  Every alternate year, there ought to be a film reminding high-schoolers that it’s more important to be smart, fun and unique. But who carries the brownie points back home is Jack Dunkleman, played by Griffin Gluck.  The poor boy, who is always available and un-cool; and to make matters worse is much shorter than the tall girl in question and to make them worst is in one-sided love with her. Does he get her? Predictable, but does she lean over to kiss him or he pulls over a stool closer by, you’ll love finding that out.

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