I don’t recall ever reading any story about a mermaid. However, I’ve seen plenty of them on television and in the movies. Of course, there was “Splash” in the 1980s, where Darryl Hannah forced me to completely reevaluate my impressionable early teen views on sexuality. Then there was “The Little Mermaid,” which forced me to completely reevaluate my cynical teenage views of the Walt Disney animated feature.

Since then, I’ve seen mermaids crop up in many different places, including an episode of “Charmed,” where I got to see Jamie Pressly and Alyssa Milano as the chicken of the sea. It’s sad to think that my entire knowledge of mermaids comes from watching television and movies.

With that in mind, “Aquamarine” followed pretty closely to the pop culture mythology I had developed for myself. The film tells the story of Claire (Emma Roberts) and Hailey (JoJo) as two teenage best friends who are facing their last summer together. Hailey’s mom is planning on moving to Australia, and Claire doesn’t think they’ll ever see each other again.

Both Claire and Hailey are pining for the love of Raymond (Jake McDorman). Of course, they’ve never been on dates themselves, but they have read every teeny bopper article ever written about boys. During a freak storm, a mermaid is washed up into Claire’s pool. The two girls make fast friends with Aquamarine (Sara Paxton), the mermaid, who has to prove to her father that love exists or she must marry against her will.

Claire and Hailey put their love of Raymond aside and try to get him to fall in love with Aquamarine. It helps that Aquamarine is prettier, more developed and more blonde than the two girls. The film soon turns into the quest to make a match in order to get a wish granted, which will be to keep Hailey in town.

“Aquamarine” is the kind of film that you have to judge based on its target audience. The “Star Wars” crowd isn’t going to be digging this movie. Nor is the Academy Award crowd. Instead, the intended audience for this film are teenage girls, preferable younger than sixteen.

In some ways, this gives “Aquamarine” the feel of a made-for-TV movie seen on one of the kids stations. The production was a limited one, and probably didn’t carry a huge budget, and that contributes to it as well. However, it still looks theatrical and works for its audience.

However, speaking as someone who is not a teenage girl, I did find some annoyances here. There was a lot of girlish squealing going on, and that’s to be expected when any group of girls get together and talk about boys.

The love that develops between Aquamarine and Raymond is laced with bubble gum and cotton candy. The film doesn’t focus on the rocky problems of love, but that’s okay. It’s a movie for younger girls, and they don’t need to worry about all the wrinkles that can show up in a relationship.

The DVD has a nice assortment of special features, including a commentary with director Elizabeth Allan and producer Susan Cartsonis. The girls from the cast also lend their voices to scene-specific commentaries, which tend to break down into giggle fests, but that’s nothing new for actor commentaries.

In addition to six deleted scenes and an introduction by the director, there are six additional featurettes, covering everything from the auditions to a fashion design.



Specifications: Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound. Widescreen (1.85:1), enhanced for 16x9 televisions. French and Spanish language tracks. French and Spanish subtitles. English language subtitles for the hearing impaired.