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13 Going on 30 Special Edition Customer Reviews (79 - 81 of 91 Reviews)

Next stop Stardom
Jennifer Garner has finally done it. She has found a role that really fits, where she doesn't have to wear tight leather or kick ass to be fantastic. Garner plays Jenna Rink, who makes a wish on her 13th birthday that she could be 30, flirty and fun. Fast forward 17 years, and Jenna wakes up in a strange bed, with a naked guy in her shower. Now on to the hilarious antics that follow. Jenna has to figure out what has gone wrond over the last 17 years, that has caused her to become such a heinous witch. She no longer has a good relationship with her parents, she no longer has the adoration of her childhood friend Matt (Mark Ruffalo), and she doesn't have the love that she wants. On the road to making things right, she has to stumble thru some extremely funny and fun scenarios. One such experience is a party thrown by her magazine that she saves by starting a Thriller dance off. Jennifer gives Jenna heart and makes it easy to love her. This is one of the funniest and funnest movies of the season. Go see it.

Surprisingly fresh and funny - old themes given a new twist!
Jenna Rink (Jennifer Garner), age 13, wants nothing more than to be "thirty, flirty, and thriving." But nothing prepares her for waking up one morning to find that her dream has come true. She stumbles out of bed only to find that she is in a strange house, and there's a naked man in her shower! Once Jenna manages to pull herself together, she sets out to discover just what's happened to her in the last 17 years, of which she has no recollection. She looks up her best friend from childhood, Matty (Mark Ruffalo), in hopes that he'll be able to help fill in the gaps. What she finds out, though, is that maybe, despite the fact that she's achieved all her childhood dreams, she's actually lost more than she's gained.

Now, the basic theme of the movie has obviously been used before - someone wishes they could jump to a different time in their life (either forward or backward depending on their goals), only to discover that once they achieve this, it's not quite all they had hoped for and they'd like nothing better than to just go back to the way things were before. But the plot is given several fun twists that keep it from feeling hackneyed. The '80s theme throughout the movie is a delightful touch, and Jennifer Garner's comedic timing is perfect, providing us with tons of genuinely funny laughs. Some moments had the whole theater in stitches! We also see Jenna discover some truths about herself and undergo transformations that are touching. The overall moral message is that true friendship is more important, and has more long-term rewards, than high school popularity.

All the actors did fantastic jobs. Jennifer Garner makes Jenna's character both touching and funny, and Mark Ruffalo is incredibly sweet and charismatic. The chemistry between the two is great. The show, however, is often stolen by the brilliant performance of Andy Serkis, who plays the adult Jenna's stuffy but loveable boss. You may know Serkis as the actor who provided Gollum's voice and actions in "The Lord of the Rings," and it's great to see him here in a more visible role. I'd definitely recommend this movie for a lighthearted weekend excursion. The ending is a little predictable, but it's done well and the overall effect is heartwarming. It's worth seeing in the theater, worth renting when it comes out, and even perhaps worth owning if you find you really like it. I certainly wouldn't mind seeing it again.

This is SO '80s and SO fun.
Expecting and getting a movie that's essentially a female remake of "Big," I must say that "13 Going On 30" was still very entertaining when I saw it in a sneak preview.

Though the performances from Jennifer Garner and Mark Ruffalo were charming and sparkled with chemistry, the most entertaining aspects of the film came when it paid homage to '80s music. The "Thriller" dance sequence, part of which is shown in the trailer, is so elaborate that it alone becomes amusing. (Wondering how it would go over in real life, I tried to figure out whether I'd join in if someone else started a "Thriller" dance line. I figured I would.) There's a later scene involving Pat Benatar's "Love Is a Battlefield" that's also good, even though those songs are more 1984 than 1987 (the year featured in the flashback).

The plot is completely predictable. It follows Jenna Rink, a 13-year-old girl in 1987, who so desperately wants to fit in with the cool crowd that she mocks the only friend who genuinely likes her, her next-door neighbor Matt.

On her birthday, following some humiliation at the hands of Scrunchi-wearing, ponytailed popular girls, Jenna wishes she could just jump ahead in her life to age 30. And, thanks to some magical wishing dust, she does.

Interestingly, in a departure from the "Big" plot that becomes its main point-of-interest, the movie's plot doesn't make her some suddenly-30-year-old who has to find out how to adjust to life in 1987. Instead, it just moves Jenna's mind at 13 into her 30-year-old self. So she gets to what her real life becomes, but with innocent eyes. And she finds that she doesn't really like who she becomes.

Along the way, she learns what's right, falls in love and does other cutesy-romantic-comedy-fantasy stuff. But the movie works. It's a lot of fun.

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