'The Hottie & the Nottie'

Rating:

BY JOHN ANDERSON | Special to Newsday

February 8, 2008

A morality fable starring Paris Hilton? Yes! The culture has reached critical mass! An amalgamation of Jane Austen plot points - but only if Miss Jane had been concerned with raw sex instead of proper marriage - "The Hottie & the Nottie" stars the celebrated hotel heiress as the woman with the power to cloud men's minds. The movie has the same capability. We're not sure how Austen would have felt.

But it's difficult to determine whether this frequently vulgar exercise in teen comedy - directed by the previously unheralded Tom Putnam - is merely a vehicle for getting Hilton out of the holding cell and in front of the cameras, or if someone really thought they had a movie here. There are moments of disturbingly convincing acting by Hilton's co-star, Christine Lakin. We're confused. More about that later.

Hilton plays Cristabel, who has been a bombshell since the age of 6, which is when Nate (Joel Moore) first laid eyes on her. A couple of decades and disastrous love affairs later, Nate decides that he'd met the perfect woman in first grade - and goes off to win her. What ensues is a series of coarsely ridiculous happenstances culminating in Nate and Cristabel reaching an understanding: She'll sleep with him, but not before they find for her cherished friend June Phigg - halt of gait, brown of teeth, balding, scabrous and socially inept - a righteous deflowering.

The film is based on two major fallacies: 1) that Paris Hilton is the most beautiful woman in the world, despite her insipid moue, and 2) that someone like June could be wandering around without attracting the attention of the Health Department. Lakin has to undergo some rather unspeakable humiliations involving her character's personal hygiene and skin conditions, before making the transition into the lovely young woman we knew was inside all along (and believe it, there are no surprises here).

Hilton, the obvious marketing hook for the film, does little besides pose, and the movie, smartly, does not concentrate all its attentions on her. Ultimately, "The Hottie & the Nottie" is no worse in many ways than a lot of teen-centric comedies, which generally appeal to their audience through cruelty and vulgarity.

THE HOTTIE & THE NOTTIE (PG-13). Ugly duckling fable about gorgeous girl and her grotesque BFF (best friend forever). Makeovers will ensue. Also, brain damage. With Paris Hilton, Christine Lakin, Joel Moore. Written by Heidi Ferrer. Directed by Tom Putnam. 1:30 (crude humor, adult content, language, dental neglect). At the Farmingdale 14, Lynbrook 6 and in Manhattan at the Empire 25.