"Josie and the Pussycats" - Film Review
Few films have been as misunderstood as Josie and the Pussycats. Released in 2001, it was almost universally panned by critics and written off as a poorly adapted cash grab using characters from the Archie comics. It is only in the past few years that Josie and the Pussycats has begun to get its due as one of the best-written critiques of American consumerism and the commodification of nearly every aspect of daily life. It is a sweetly packaged, delightfully fun romp through the music industry accompanied by an incredible soundtrack of original rock songs. Few films have been able to create that balance as perfectly as Josie and the Pussycats.
The film opens with a performance by the number one boy band in the world, DuJour (Donald Faison, Seth Green, Breckin Meyer, and Alexander Martin), singing their hit single “Backdoor Lover.” (How critics didn’t understand that this film is a satire from the beginning, when the opening scene is a boy band singing “Backdoor Lover” with utter sincerity, will never make sense.) After the performance, the band boards their private jet with MegaRecords executive Wyatt (Alan Cumming) and confronts him about a strange background track of subliminal messages they found under one of their songs. This backing track was clearly supposed to be a secret, and Wyatt, along with the pilot, parachutes out of the plane, leaving DuJour to die.
Wyatt lands in the town of Riverdale and has been tasked by his angry, mysterious boss, Fiona (Parker Posey), to find a new band so the company can continue to use music to spread subliminal messages for the government. He stumbles across The Pussycats, made up of Josie (Rachael Leigh Cook), Val (Rosario Dawson), and Mel (Tara Reid), and signs them without ever hearing them play. All of a sudden, The Pussycats are caught up in a whirlwind of success, but they quickly grow suspicious of their sudden fame.
universal pictures + 20th century fox
Viewers are offered a visual overload of product placement. Except during scenes of the house Josie, Mel, and Val share in Riverdale, almost everything in the background is emblazoned with a brand name or logo. The plane DuJour boards has the Target bullseye painted on the walls, the tables, and all of the pillows. The McDonalds-themed hotel bathroom, the Times Square-esque city block that is seemingly only billboards, and all of the subliminal messages in the music. The filmmakers were not paid for any of their product placement, instead, they used it purposefully to mirror the way American society is inundated with advertisements everywhere they look.
Perhaps part of the reason for the initial panning of Josie and the Pussycats was the culture it was released into. In 2001, pop culture was invasive and cruel to women. Not that things have improved all that much, but there has been a reckoning of sorts with the #MeToo movement and a greater awareness of the way women were treated by the media in the early-aughts. During that time, it seemed women could be the joke, but they could never tell the joke. In Josie and the Pussycats, Josie, Val, and Mel refuse to be the joke and refuse to act as pawns for the dastardly plans of the government. It’s a direct critique of the social landscape of the time.
Josie and the Pussycats works on multiple levels. On the surface, the movie is fun, with an earworm-filled soundtrack that is pure delight, making many a viewer wish they were a real band. On a deeper level, it is a hard look at such an uncensored demonstration of how advertising and consumerism permeate so many facets of daily life. The ability of writer/director team Harry Elfont and Deborah Kaplan to balance these two opposite thematic goals in a comedy is no small feat. It’s disappointing that Josie and the Pussycats didn’t receive the acclaim it deserves when it was originally released, but it has been lovely to see critics reassess its merit.
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