“Hannah Montana: The Movie” just shouldn’t be analyzed from an adult perspective. The big-screen version of the Disney TV series is made for girls aged 6-14 and no one else.
This will come as no surprise at all: They’re gonna love it.
If you were a 10-year-old girl, you would of course want to be small- town sweetheart Miley Stewart and/or her secret pop-star alter ego, Hannah Montana.
Miley Cyrus makes both characters so likably harmless and so attractively accessible, it’s hard not to be charmed.
Just try to resist her endless supply of energy and moxie!
Even when she gets a little petulant and carried away with her celebrity lifestyle in Los Angeles — which prompts a return to Tennessee for some hometown reprogramming — she still has a magnetism about her.
Nevertheless, “Hannah Montana: The Movie” drags us all back to the fictional Crowley Corners to bang us over the head with the message that big cities are bad and small towns are good. And there’s plenty of down-home singin’ to emphasize that point.
The predictable film finds Miley’s dad, Robby Ray (Cyrus’ real-life father, Billy Ray), taking her home against her will to reconnect with her roots.
Miley and Billy Ray have an obvious, comfortable bond on camera; the moments they share seem sincere and provide some much-needed substance amid the perkiness and pratfalls.
“Hannah Montana: The Movie”
G. 1 hour, 38 minutes. Directed by Peter Chelsom; written by Dan Berendsen; starring Miley Cyrus, Emily Osment, Margo Martindale, Peter Gunn, Barry Bostwick, Moises Arias, Rascal Flatts, Taylor Swift, with Vanessa Williams and Billy Ray Cyrus. Opens today at area theaters.
