A giant smile of a movie with some kick-ass attitude to boot, Whip It proves a perfect match of project and director. One of the year's most charming and jubilant films, made by one of Hollywood's sunniest presences, Drew Barrymore, it’s a welcome blast of grade-A Girl Power.

Barrymore's directorial debut tells the story of Bliss (Ellen Page), 17-year-old resident of a Texas town so tiny it's barely noticeable, and one of her hometown's most prolific beauty queens. The thought of the Juno star as a beauty pageant contestant seems odd, but that’s the point: Bliss has fallen victim to the nepotistic and narcissistic desires of her domineering mother, Brooke (Marcia Gay Harden), who clings to the glory of her own beauty queen past by submitting Bliss to the same sort of ritualistic torture.

But Bliss has different dreams. Restless in her small-town home, she has never had the guts to break free. So when she first spots a few rowdy roller girls as they skate by her at a thrift store, she nearly averts her eyes -- she has found something new and exciting, but is too repressed to pursue it. With a gentle nudge from her more brazen best friend, Pash (Alia Shawkat, best known as Maeby from the series Arrested Development), Bliss sneaks out to a roller derby one night, where she swoons over the force and power of the players, with their retro outfits, gaudy make-up, and awesomely ridiculous nicknames. She quickly digs out her old Barbie skates and trains to join the down-and-out Hurl Scouts, perennial losers of an Austin-based roller derby league. Bliss' speed makes her an instant draw, and soon she becomes Babe Ruthless, the league's new star.

Page is quickly becoming the best actress of her generation, and this part offers further proof of her immense range. Except for the iconoclastic attitude, Bliss is the polar opposite of Juno -- frightened, weary, and completely unsure of herself. Watching the shy, diminutive heroine ever-so-slightly bite her lip in anticipation of going to a roller derby is priceless. The rest of the terrific cast doesn’t let her down, either -- from Harden as the rigid-but-nuanced pageant mom, to Kristen Wiig as the down-to-earth team captain, to Barrymore herself, hysterical as the Hurl Scouts' resident bad-ass. Meanwhile, Andrew Wilson brings great humor and charm as the team’s long-suffering coach.

Barrymore’s decades of working with directors of all stripes has clearly informed the skills so evident in this first feature, but she infuses her own inimitable charm into the film as well. One senses her hand behind the actors’ beautiful quirks, but she also has style to burn -- she crafts some beautiful frames and seems to know exactly the right spots to inject adrenaline through her soundtrack.

The one letdown is Shauna Cross' screenplay, based on her novel, Derby Girl, which never finds a natural flow. As a result, the movie sometimes seems like it is racing along to hit all the familiar coming-of-age/sports-underdog touchstones while simultaneously turning them on their heads. Luckily, Barrymore's own rhythm more than makes up for any script sputtering, and the actors all breathe jubilant life into this very character-driven story.

Whip It is a both a wonderful romp and a poignant coming-of-age story. Credit Barrymore for finding the right balance, and for finding the common element that binds it all together: a woman's strength. She understands that true girl power is not merely the bubblegum song-and-dance of the Charlie's Angels pictures, but a long, winding, complex road of choices and compromises, and it takes true strength to navigate it and come away unscathed. If you can manage it, you deserve a nickname like "Bloody Holly" or "Babe Ruthless."



When a problem comes along...