Girl in Progress
Lionsgate | Release Date: May 11, 2012 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
45
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 17 Critic Reviews
Positive:
3
Mixed:
10
Negative:
4
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
70
The New York TimesA.O. ScottMay 10, 2012
The movie, by virtue of its self-conscious parody of the kind of movie it is, turns out to be an unusually smart and sensitive example of the genre. Read full review
67
Austin ChronicleMarc SavlovMay 9, 2012
Girl in Progress is an old story about a young girl told in a smart way, and that's something you don't see every day, no matter how many times you think you've seen it before. Read full review
63
New York PostLou LumenickMay 11, 2012
The two lead actresses rise to the occasion when they're finally forced to confront each other at the climax. Read full review
60
Los Angeles TimesSheri LindenMay 10, 2012
Mendes is charismatic and likable as Grace - perhaps too likable. Conveying Grace's parental blind spots, she doesn't turn her character's single motherhood into an argument for sainthood. Yet she avoids any darker glimpses that would lend a more satisfying complexity to the mother-daughter tension and to the movie's too-neat ending. Read full review
60
New York Daily NewsJoe NeumaierMay 10, 2012
A well-done, conscientious and funny little film that recalls "Clueless," only with more heart. Read full review
60
MovielineMichelle OrangeMay 10, 2012
Girl in Progress feels a little trapped by its own conceits: It plays with the idea that all rebellion is in some sense performed and makes a caricature out of the immature, attention-hungry mother, but it never liberates its characters from their molds. Read full review
60
New York Magazine (Vulture)David EdelsteinMay 7, 2012
The movie goes soft. But it has the unpretentious energy and charm of a good YA girls' novel. Read full review
50
USA TodayClaudia PuigMay 10, 2012
Seems like a work in progress. Read full review
50
VarietyBoyd van HoeijMay 10, 2012
Never finds its own groove, alternating between high-school dramedy and overworked-single-mom narratives without ever really becoming a mother-and-daughter story until the closing scenes. Read full review
50
TimeMary PolsMay 10, 2012
Unfortunately, Girl in Progress doesn't upend anything; it just makes us weary of its wisecracking, oblivious teen and her ditzy mom. Read full review
40
Boxoffice MagazineMark OlsenMay 12, 2012
This archly self-aware coming-of-age tale fizzles, as the targeted Latino audience is upstaged by a culture more firmly rooted in the film's soggy Seattle setting. Read full review
40
Village VoiceMelissa AndersonMay 8, 2012
Unconvincing, flawed matriarch Mendes and junior showboat Ramirez appear to be acting in entirely different movies. Read full review
40
Time OutR. Emmet SweeneyMay 8, 2012
Uneasily poised between glib irony and earnest melodrama, Patricia Riggen's coming-of-age tale is as scattered as its manic pubescent protagonist. Read full review
38
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertMay 9, 2012
Ansiedad is a smart charmer, and well-played by Cierra Ramirez, she should really be above this sort of thing - above the whole movie, really. Read full review
25
The A.V. ClubNathan RabinMay 12, 2012
Girl In Progress is ultimately less interested in subverting the clichés of the genre than in recycling them. It wants audiences to know it's in on the joke though it's not always apparent that there even is a joke in the first place. Read full review
25
Entertainment WeeklyLisa SchwarzbaumMay 9, 2012
This inauthentic teen tale, with its cosmetically softened edges, serves neither the young people nor the Mendes fans for whom it might be intended. Read full review
25
Slant MagazineNick SchagerMay 7, 2012
Girl in Progress operates like a training-wheels melodrama for genre-uneducated tweens. Read full review
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