The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (2005)
(On Cable TV, May 2022) My pre-movie warmup routine for films such as The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants is simple: I just repeat, “This film is not for you” to myself a few times. It’s really the key to letting go of incompatible expectations. Made for a specific type of audience, this is less a film about magical pants than four subplots patched together, each of them going for a specific kind of teenage wish-fulfillment. The simple structure gets going when four lifelong high-school friends buy a pair of pants that somehow fits each of them perfectly, then vow to send it to each other even through the summer they’re about to spend apart. Then it’s off to the separate subplots until the synthesis of the third act. One sister goes to Greece and falls in love with a young man from an enemy family; one goes to South Carolina and finds out that her remarrying father is the most clueless man alive; one goes to Mexico for nothing of great importance; and the last remains home to film a documentary of sad people like her. Through it all, the pants are hyped as mystical garments able to let them discover and fulfill their destiny. If you’re part of the intended audience, this is really your chance to sit back and enjoy four subplots about early adulthood – a few infuriating moments are there to raise the stakes, but otherwise you know it’s all going to end up well. This being said (and there’s my “this film is not for you” mantra slipping away), anyone approaching this film as a work of magical realism is going to be frustrated – other than the pants fitting everyone, there’s very little about the rest of the film that depends on fantasy. That’s probably not a bad idea – the original novel also used the pants as an excuse for a far more down-to-earth story of friends learning to exist on their own, with some help from each other. It’s ideally suited to teenage girls, or anyone looking for a bit of unchallenging fare. It’s also a decent showcase for the four young actresses in the lead roles – perhaps the most distinctive being America Ferrera, as she’s the one to affirm the magical-pants premise, and because her plot line is more interesting than the others. Otherwise, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants is almost exactly what it promises to be: a four-way summer romp, from the spectacle of Greek islands to the reclamation of an estranged father. This film is not for me… but I found it watchable.