Crossroads (2002)

She may be a head shaving, crotch flashing, umbrella wielding, hard drinking, chain smoking, baby endangering train wreck these days, but Britney Spears wasn't always like that. As little as five years ago, Britney was on top of the music charts and ready to conquer Hollywood. She was more than a girl, but not yet a woman. Whatever the hell she was, one thing is for sure - Ms. Spears could act. This was illustrated by Britney's first starring role in the film Crossroads.

Crossroads begins with three girls burying a time capsule and promising to be best friends forever, or BFF for you text messengers out there. The story then fast-forwards several years later, as those three girls are about to graduate high school. Unfortunately, as the girls grew older, they also grew apart.

One of those girls is Lucy, a high school valedictorian, played by Spears. Lucy has lived a very overprotected life, thanks to her father. Lucy's dad (played by acting and ghost-busting legend Dan Aykroyd) means well and just wants her to focus on studying so she can become a doctor. He does not want her wasting time doing standard teenage girls activities — which I assume includes chasing after boys, having pillow fights and attending pajama parties. Lucy's dream however is to become a musician. Screw curing cancer, she has a song in her heart!


At a post-graduation get together, Lucy meets up with the two friends (Kit and Mimi) that she buried the time capsule with years earlier. Kit is a prom queen, who attended all the parties while Lucy stayed at home studying. Mimi is pregnant and like Lucy, dreams of a career as a singer. Mimi suggests they go dig up the capsule, but the other two girls want no part of it. Lucy has more important things to do that night then digging up a box; she plans to have someone dig into her box.

You see, before heading off to college, Lucy wants to cross one thing off of her to-do list. She and her lab partner Henry (Justin Long, best known as the Mac guy from the Mac/PC commercials) have agreed to de-flower one another. As an eager young Henry waits to get lucky, Britney does a little striptease down to her underwear (she used to wear some back in those days), and basically tells young Henry that, “I'm a slave for you.” Before they can consummate their relationship, they both realize that they do not have that special feeling that they had envisioned for their first time, and decide to not partake in any hot hanky-panky action. This is a very touching scene, one that is guaranteed to have any viewer shed a few tears, or possibly some other type of bodily fluid.

Lucy, Mimi and Kit all end up at the site of the burial. After some initial awkward moments between the three, they agree to embark on a mutually beneficial road trip to Los Angeles. Joining them is Ben, a guitarist who has agreed to drive them to L.A. At first Lucy tells Ben that you drive me crazy, but eventually they give each other some satisfaction, if you know what I mean.

The four youngsters experience every emotion under the sun on this trip - love, anger, hate, disappointment, happiness - they are not just riding the highway to Los Angeles - they are truly riding the highway of life.

Does this connoisseur recommend Crossroads? Well, that question can best be answered by these lyrics from the Britney song “Soda Pop”:

“Open that soda pop, bop-a shu-bop shu-bop/ The clock is tickin and we can't stop”

If this movie were indeed soda pop, I would guzzle down a 12-pack so fast it would make your head spin.

It's a crying shame that to date, Britney has not had a follow up starring role. Unfortunately Spears has had some personal issues — basically, bitch be crazy! She can continue to go down the path she is going - that's her prerogative. However, I truly believe that she will stop with this toxic behaviour, and end up better off for having gone through it all. She will be stronger than yesterday. She will be able to say to Hollywood “hit me baby one more time”, and follow it up by saying “and by hit, I mean give me the opportunity to star in another motion picture.” By golly, let's hope they do.

Perhaps the man who could provide her with the opportunity to return to the silver screen is Batman Begins director Chris Nolan. Now that Britney has shaved her head, and has begun to utilize an umbrella as a weapon, she would seem to be an ideal candidate to play The Penguin in the next Batman film.