Whip It - Movie Review

Roller Derby and Teenage Rebellion in America

Spinning down the arena on eight wheels is not easy especially when there there are many others out there blocking your move. It takes courage, speed, agility and determination to accomplish this and achieve points in a potentially dangerous sport played predominantly by young women - Roller Derby.

Whip it starring Ellen Page of Juno fame, Drew Barrymore, and Kirstin Wiig is a movie that celebrates roller derby during an age when the roller skating itself is in serious decline across the US. With youngsters getting interested in console gaming and virtual play skating rinks across the US are struggling to sustain themselves and keep afloat. Roller Derby is a much less respected sport and is often considered a violent sport where women beat each other up. In popular perception it is the sport of tramps, drug addicts and losers.

Whatever it maybe the Whip it team has been able to present Roller Derby as a contact sport as intense as American Football. The movie centers around Bliss a teenager in small-town Texas whose postal employee mom wants to make her a beauty queen. On the contrary Bliss gets attracted by Roller Derby and starts seriously practicing for the sport. Her petite frame and determination enable her to make it into one of the teams.

The rest of the story is a short broken romantic fling she has with a wannabe rock star she meets during one of the after-derby parties. Her intensely committed practice regimen, and of course the derby plays themselves. Don't dismiss this movie as some girlie flick, it is indeed as action packed as any of the guy movies I have seen. The action is not blood and gore, but inside the stadium sporting. Of course there is a liberal dose of fistcuffs between girls in the movie too.

Watch it, you will not be disappointed.