There was a time in my teenage when i used to love this genre; however, that has completely changed now. I had a lot of fun watching this movie, Alicia Silverstone acting was adorable. The story and plot was beautiful and unique in some way. This genre is most of the very predictable where an unpopular girl likes a popular guy or vice versa, but this story was much different then what i expected.

As I go further back in time regarding IMDb's Top 250 lists, I find that I'm repeating myself in saying that I'm not part of the target audience for a picture like this, and that the early days of IMDb had to be heavily influenced by hordes of teenage viewers rating movies like "Clueless" so highly. Time has taken it's toll a bit by now, and for a pretty good reason; the movie just isn't that good, even for a teen comedy. It has it's moments of course, and Alicia Silverstone's character isn't as clueless as the title of the movie would suggest, but the picture offers a lot of fluff stringing together a variety of situations for Cher (Silverstone) and her cliquey friends. The one good takeaway is the way Cher befriended newcomer Tai (Brittany Murphy) into her circle and helped her become popular, in her own right. But throughout the cast, I couldn't come up with a single role model I'd point to as being someone I'd want a teenager of today to emulate. For what it's worth, my borrowed DVD copy offered up the 'Whatever' edition of the movie, which may or may not mean anything, as I'm not bothered enough to try and find out. Really, as if.

Is this movie good or what!? Alicia Silverstone is sooo cute, like hellloo, and considerably hot, so's Stacey Dash, majorly, and Elisa Donavon's brutally hot too. These girls are all sooo pretty, duuh, I totally worship them, specifically Alicia. She's one smart girl. Wow, check out young foxy Brittany! She is the ultimate hot cutie babe, yeeah. She's not as cute as the other girls yet, how old is she in this?...ah, they're giving Brittany a makeover! It sounds mental but I've never seen Clueless all the way through until now, it's totally embarrassing I know. They gave Britt her makeover! She's positively a billion times hotter than the other girls, no joke. Brittany Murphy is one of the most super duper beautiful people who's ever died young. I love her, it's insane, I totally miss her. Clueless' so dope! I was clueless how good it is, well not entirely I mean I knew I'd love it because I love smart and good spirited sweet heartfelt movies like this and assuredly chick flicks with major superhotties everywhere, howeverr Clueless totally opened the door, seriously laid the groundwork, and definitely paved the way for Legally Blonde's success over half a decade later, uhh, as if! I'm such a brown-noser. Clueless is a popular cultural splash with great style and way super fashionable! It's so faabulous and so fun and kinda deep! Alicia Silverstone is an underappreciated superstar actress. She's soooo sweet, as if! Whateverrr, I love Clueless! I'm making a W with my thumbs and index fingers for whaateverrr, and here's an L for all you looosers out there who don't love Clueless now put it on your forehead, ha just kidding I love you guys, just like this movie, and Brittany, and Alicia, and Stacey.

Jane Austen, along with E M Forster, was one of the entertainment industry's favourite authors during the nineties, when several adaptations of her novels were made, both for the cinema and for television. During the middle part of the decade there were no fewer than three adaptations of her "Emma", including the feature film with Gwyneth Paltrow and the TV movie with Kate Beckinsale, both from 1996. The third was "Clueless" from the previous year. At first sight, "Clueless" would not appear to have anything to do with Austen at all. It is set not in Regency England but in a contemporary Beverly Hills high school. The characters and incidents, however, closely parallel those in the original novel. In British usage the word "clueless" is normally a synonym for "stupid". (It is often used in Northern England as an alternative to "gormless"). It would appear, however, that in American usage its meaning can be closer to "awkward", "gauche" or "socially inept"; when characters in the film are described as "clueless" it implies ignorance of the social conventions which prevail in the school. The Emma Woodhouse of the school is Cher Horowitz, the fifteen-year-old daughter of a successful lawyer. Because Cher is attractive, from a wealthy family and looks good in a mini-skirt, she is the "most popular girl in the school". Unlike most girls who are referred to in this way in high school comedies, however, Cher is not snobbish or bitchy. In fact, she is rather kind-hearted and well-intentioned, if at times thoughtless and superficial. She likes to do what she sees as "good deeds", which generally means playing matchmaker for her friends, and even two of her teachers. The film's title refers to Cher's efforts to educate a "clueless" newcomer, Tai, in the ways of the school and to find a boyfriend for her. (Tai is the equivalent of Austen's character Harriet Smith). Alicia Silverstone was one of a number of beautiful young actresses in the nineties who seemed set for Hollywood stardom but who never quite made it, or at least only achieved it temporarily before retiring or slipping back into the B-list; others included Julia Ormonde, Bridget Fonda, Phoebe Cates and Silverstone's co-star here, Stacey Dash. The third female lead here, Brittany Murphy, cast against type as the rather dowdy Tai, did become a major star, but her career was cut short by her tragically early death. Yet Silverstone's performance here shows just why she was tipped for stardom. She makes Cher not just attractive but also smart, funny and appealing, the sort of teenage girl who, for all her flaws, would have every teenage boy mad for her. The one thing Silverstone never quite manages is to persuade us that Cher is only fifteen, even though at nineteen she was younger than a lot of actresses called upon to play high school girls. (Dash, who plays Cher's best friend Dionne, was 28). Cher comes across as being just too adult, too knowing and too sexual for her supposed age. Cher's fretting about the fact that she has yet to lose her virginity struck me as a bit inappropriate for a fifteen-year-old. I wondered, in fact, if the film might have been better if writer/director Amy Heckerling had set her story in a college rather than in a high school, that is to say among young people closer in age to Austen's characters. Doubtless, however, the studio wanted to keep the teenage market. Another thing that struck me as odd is that the George Knightley figure is Cher's ex-stepbrother Josh- their parents are divorced- which means that two people brought up together as brother and sister, even if they are not biologically related, end up as boyfriend and girlfriend. I know that "Cruel Intentions", another teenage comedy from the nineties, also dealt with step-siblings who were impliedly sexually attracted to one another, but then in that film Kathryn and Sebastian were supposed to be a bit weird and creepy; Cher and Josh are supposed to be much more normal. In Austen's novel George is the brother-in-law of Emma's best friend Isabella, but the film-makers departed from the text, probably because Dionne is black and following Austen too closely in this respect would have meant either giving Dionne a white boyfriend or Cher a black one. Hollywood's traditional uneasiness about interracial romance was stronger in the nineties than it is today. "Clueless" (like the "Bill and Ted" adventures) is firmly rooted in nineties youth culture, especially the fashions and American teenage slang of the period. We learn that an ugly man is a "barney" (as in the purple dinosaur) and a handsome one a "Baldwin" (as in Alec, William and Stephen). A pretty woman is a "Betty", the etymology of which seems more obscure. (One explanation I have heard is that "Betty" was Lauren Bacall's real name, but I doubt if Cher and her crowd would have heard of Bacall, let alone cared what her real name was). Even in 1995 British audiences would have needed subtitles to understand all the dialogue, and today, more than 20 years on, I suspect that some American ones would as well. Like its heroine, "Clueless" can sometimes seem a bit superficial, despite its august literary antecedents, but on the whole it is all good fun. Even though its original teenage audience will now have children- in some cases teenage children- of their own, it holds up surprisingly well (apart from its dated slang) in the twenty-first century and is starting to acquire a cult appeal as a sort of nostalgic relic. 6/10