Rewind Files: She’s All That Stands For the Glory Days of High School

Rewind Files is when we take a second look at a piece of media to gain a better sense of its greatness, its awfulness, or its place in the cultural landscape. 

When you first step onto the unnamed SoCal high school featured in She’s All That, you’re greeted with a bouncy Paul Walker telling a graceful Freddie Prinze, Jr. a rumor about how one of their classmates had sex on a plane (26,000 feet up, he adds, which for some reason makes it more impressive). It’s a preposterous sentence, but She’s All That plays it as “Heh, high school, amiright?” which is pretty much the whole thrust of the movie. This thing has the wackest conception of high school ever, which dates it more than any of its delightful 1999-isms.

She’s All That is a teen version of Pygmalion/Pretty Woman. It came out in 1999 and is remembered most for its insane lineup of “stars before they were stars.” Freddie Prinze, Jr. and Paul Walker, for starters, but then there are roles for Anna Paquin, Gabrielle Union, Dulé Hill (from Psych), Lil Kim, and Usher Raymond, also known as Usher, also known as the greatest effing R&B musician this side of 2000. Weirdly, the least famous person in the movie is the lead, Rachael Leigh Cook, who, even though her charm is so effortless in She’s All That, never did much else in Hollywood.

But anyway, the movie is a Pygmalion rip-off in which Paul Walker bets Freddie Prinze, Jr. he can’t turn artistic weirdo Rachael Leigh Cook into a prom queen. Complications ensue when, of course, Freddie Prinze catches feelings for Rachael Leigh during his fake courtship of her. If it sounds familiar, that’s because She’s All That came out the same year as the akin teen rom-com 10 Things I Hate About You, with Heath Ledger, Julia Stiles, and Joseph Gordon-Levitt. 10 Things is based on Shakespeare’s Taming of the Shrew, but it hinges on a central romantic bet similar to the one in Pygmalion. There wasn’t a rich mine of original teen stories in the late 90s, it would seem.

She’s All That is a bit more of its era than its teen-flick siblings, however. On one hand, it’s absolutely seeping with a 1999 glaze. The opening credits ooze in with a Nickelodeon Slime Time Live­-like animation, Paul Walker (major, major douche in this movie) says the phrase “badass momba ja-homba,” there’s no-joke a choreographed dance number to Fatboy Slim’s “Rockafeller Skank” (lead by ya boi Usher), and a key romantic moment is punctuated by Sixpence None the Richer’s “Kiss Me.” A beach-volleyball montage, the parade of board shorts, and usage of the word “copacetic” all deserve mention, too. It’s amazing a boy band didn’t show up, though there are plenty of frosted tips.

But aside from the delirious period piece She’s All That turns out to be, it really only becomes dated when you think about its presentation of high school as a whole. Teen shows and movies have always been a touch more mature than real life—Fast Times At Ridgemont High is raunchier than Superbad, and teen crime series like Riverdale and Pretty Little Liars are positively absurd in terms of the obstacles they present their sophomore characters—but She’s All That sets itself apart from other high-school settings in that it barely even attempts to strike a high-school tone.

Everything in this movie is cranked to maximum. The trash-talking (about 70-percent of the dialogue, seriously) reaches Apatow levels of vulgarity, and the sexual politics feel more collegiate than anything close to teenage. Parents are almost non-existent, save a nice moment between Rachael Leigh Cook and her dad, and the parties are extravagant enough to pass for club scenes. While most items in this genre tend to strain your conception of who a teen is (no one in Glee even looked like a high-schooler), She’s All That never even tries to sell it. These are adults having teen problems. That doesn’t really make the movie bad—it’s still legit funny and the cast is of course fantastic—but it does make it more distinct than ever compared with modern shows and movies in the same setting.

With 13 Reasons Why, American Vandal and Riverdale all excelling this year, there’s been somewhat of a renaissance in teen movies. That’s not to mean a boost in quality—Superbad is an all-timer, Fast Times is immortal—it’s to mean a recommitment to presenting high school with some semblance of realism. Sure, Riverdale is as much a crime show as it is a teen drama, but it still dives deep into the social dynamics of frenemies, guy-girl besties, and sibling-classmates. American Vandal is satire, but it has the most honest portrayal of high-schoolers on TV. 13 Reasons Why is so earnest it has no choice but to be as teenage as possible. The fact that particular show takes its dramatics to such extremes only underlines the point, even if there’s plenty to say about whether those dramatics are fair or not.

Juxtaposed against these, She’s All That becomes even more of a cultural item. It becomes a gleeful reminder of a time when teen entertainment bit harder, embraced silliness, and gave the finger every now and then. The movie’s malicious, from its throat-slashing gossip to its pube-pizza torture acts, and in a time where things like 13 Reasons and Glee are demanding to be taken seriously, ugh, that cut-em-down tone is a joy to watch. If you had a teenager, you’d worry about their normality if all they did was weep for others. Kids can be woke, but they can also be super selfish, so sometimes it’s a relief when they roll their eyes and give you the finger.