Little: Film Review
We have had a lot of these ‘person falls under curse’ type movies of late, with What Men Want and Isn’t It Romantic springing to mind as recent examples, so Little doesn’t feel particularly fresh or exciting, but at least it introduces us to the wonders of Marsai Martin.
Little follows Jordan Sanders (Regina Hall) who was bullied at school for being nerdy and is now a cold, difficult rich tech mogul who treats everyone like trash. One day she is cursed by a young girl and transforms back into her younger self (played by Martin). With the help of her assistant April (Issa Rae), Jordan goes back to school and learns what she did wrong the first time and April holds down the fort at the company, which is on the brink of losing its biggest client.
The formula is quite tired, especially following on from What Men Want and Isn’t It Romantic, and it is basically a reverse Big, so I wasn’t excited about experiencing those same beats – discovering the new self, trying to get someone to believe it’s you, figuring out how to get back to your old self – but Little feels different enough that it’s still enjoyable and pretty funny.
I probably wouldn’t be as positive about it if it wasn’t for Martin. The 14-year-old will be known to fans of the TV show Black-ish but this is her introduction to the masses and wow, she is talented. She is a star in the making. She has attitude, sass and you truly believe she is an adult in that young body. She provided great comedy value – particularly in scenes with hot teacher Mr. Marshall (Justin Hartley) – and rocked the most incredible outfits. Oh, and it’s probably worth mentioning that she came up with the idea so she has a producer credit, making her the youngest person ever to do so.
Rae is well known for her TV series Insecure, which I haven’t seen, so it was exciting to see her on the big screen. She has the most screen time in the movie and she’s very sweet, funny and likeable. Hall really goes OTT with the stone-cold bitch attitude so it didn’t feel like a realistic character but she has some fun moments.
Little made me laugh out loud a few times but not as much as I’d hoped. The script is really funny at times but often it’s just mildly amusing. Some jokes are fantastically witty and brilliant while others fall flat, so it’s not a complete success. It’s an average comedy with a familiar premise but worth a watch simply for Martin (and the clothes and music).
In cinemas from Friday 12th April