After a successful stint on TV, Lucy Hale dude's up for the big screen in Netflix's 'Dude'
Lucy Hale's leaving her television days behind, and seems to have taken a step up with Netflix's film, 'Dude'.
A sort of coming of age post-high school drama, it has everything that makes late adolescence real - friends, tears and a lot of pot.
Honestly, if you haven't watched it already, you really need to.
The plot is set around a tight-knit girl gang of four, who, like every one of us in high school, try to find ways they can to be together after they part ways.
The film stars Lucy Hale, Kathryn Prescott, Alexandra Shipp, Awkwafina, Austin Butler and Michaela Watkins.
Written and directed by Olivia Milch, this debut has to be one of the best in the comedy-drama genre of films we have today.
Simply because it is so relatable and real - the boy talk, the curiosity and exploration about sexual appetite and trying out substances. Lucy Hale, especially, in her role as Lily, reminds you of a friend or a girl at school you knew at some point.
She plays the confident pretty girl who knows she looks good and isn't afraid to flaunt it. She loves weed, taking dumps at school (yes) and is super popular. At the same time, she's terrible with responsibilities about something as small as picking something for prom.
A trait very common in every early twenty graduates, she plays the role so well that I almost want to smack her on the head and instruct her on how to do things.
The glue of the gang, she portrays the role of a control freak and know it all so well, you almost want to do a marathon for 'Pretty Little Liars'. But she's got her priorities sorted, like most people that age it isn't herself, it is her best friends. And her bong, of course.
A senior bound for NYU, she spends her days hanging out with her best friends, who are very woke - a very important and realistic peek into today's 20 something generation. In the trailer, you see Awkwafina, who is of Asian descent, just chilling in with her gang looking bored as she jokes about having "token white friends."
A far cry from the traditional millennial drama surrounding women, no? It may be called 'Dude' but its all about the girls!
Lucy Hale's performance is raunchy, unapologetic and on point making it absolutely a fun watch - even if you hated these girls in high school, you'll be surprised by how much you like this film. The loss is real, the pain is real and the confusion of the end of high school and the beginning of adulthood is weaved in beautifully. There's no space for the unreal prim and proper teens here, 'Dude' is all about the mistakes we make.
It's got great reviews from the audience and it gives us so many hopes. But this isn't the first big film that she's done since her 'Pretty Little Liars' stint ended just last year.
As the show ended, one could tell that she's going to start over - she cut off her signature Aria hair to a short crop and even changed the color. It's like she was saying that that particular chapter in her life was over and she was ready to start over.
At the time, she was itching to do something "insane and crazy" and bam! came 'Dude'.
The ABC show that came back for seven seasons, was Hale's ticket to fame. The plot surrounds a group of friends, who live their lives in the fictional town of Rosewood. Aria Montgomery (Lucy Hale), Hanna Marin (Ashley Benson), Emily Fields (Shay Mitchell), Spencer Hastings (Troian Bellisario) and Alison DiLaurentis (Sasha Pieterse), find their lives thrown upside down after a secret stalker threatens to reveal their secret.
Critics were quite happy with it too, commenting that it "makes most popular vampire romances look anemic" while concluding, 'Pretty Little Liars' could go in several directions, including mundane teen clichés. It's got an equally good shot at making us care about these imperfect pretty girls.
Hale's fascination with playing characters is abundantly clear - and she almost didn't take it. Imagine that. She told Cosmopolitan in an interview, "I was offered another pilot, but my gut kept telling me to go towards Pretty Little Liars," she said, "There was just something about that name that kept replaying in my head and I knew that that was probably the right decision to make.
It's very easy to get excited about the glitz and glam of something, or how much you're getting paid, or get distracted by who else is involved but I think the reason I made the choice for PLL was that creatively it really excited me."
Even with acting itself, she was just as passionate. Perhaps why she's doing so well is because she is so in love with what she's doing. Speaking to Covetuer, she revealed that she never really had a Plan B and it was completely okay. "There have been moments in my acting career where I’m like, "Would I want to stop this and do something else?' I think that’s normal to question what you do. Then I’ll get a sign from the universe that’s like, 'No, you’re on the path that you’re supposed to be on.'" She often talks about how work makes her feel "so overwhelmed with the joy" that she could never "imagine anything making" her as happy.
She auditioned for 'Hannah Montana' at one point too and has appeared in cameo roles in 'The O.C' and ' How I Met Your Mother' after which PPL happened that catapulted her to fame in front of more than 2 million viewers that the show had on average.
She also appeared in a horror flick called 'Truth or Dare', which follows Hale and her friends as a harmless game goes horribly wrong.
The film did not get good reviews from critics but did show Hale's zest for creative exploration. It almost looks like she always wanted to conquer television - and boy did she do it well. Keep an eye out Hollywood - Lucy Hale is here on business.
