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Movies / On DVD / New Best Friend
New Best Friend

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New Best Friend (2002)

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Reviews Counted:38

Fresh:2

Rotten:36

Average Rating:2.9/10

Consensus: Generic, confusing, and trashy, New Best Friend is a laughably bad, obvious campus whodunit.

Runtime: 1 hr 31 mins

Genre: Dramas

Synopsis: It's January, the start of a new semester at exclusive Colby University nestled in the Carolina countryside. Near the campus, four young women prepare themselves for the final semester of their... It's January, the start of a new semester at exclusive Colby University nestled in the Carolina countryside. Near the campus, four young women prepare themselves for the final semester of their senior year. In her dingy apartment over the "He's Not Here Tavern," where she lives with her mother, ALICIA GLAZER (Mia Kirshner) organizes her school supplies. She is plain as well as poor. On the other side of town, in an exclusive row house, three beautiful and privileged young coeds start their day: sensuous HADLEY WESTON (Meredith Monroe), luxuriates in a bubble bath with a margarita in hand; her junk-food loving bulemic roommate JULIANNE McINTYRE (Rachel True) wolfs down a huge bowl of cereal and immediately runs into the bathroom to throw it up; and oversexed SYDNEY CONNORS (Dominique Swain) slowly wakes up next to her boyfriend, JOSH (Oliver Hudson), and some poor townie who is shocked to discover how she spent the night. Classes begin and Alicia is paired with Hadley to work on the all-important sociology class senior thesis project titled, "Lead, Follow or Get Out of the Way." At first rejected, Alicia is finally accepted into Hadley's clique where she is introduced to a world of privilege and dangerous thrills. But her attempts to become one of them ultimately land her in the hospital. As the local sheriff, ARTIE BONNER (Taye Diggs), tries to determine the chain of events that led to Alicia's collapse, his investigation casts a shadow of responsibility over the untouchable, affluent young women. -- © 2002 TriStar Pictures [More]

Starring: Mia Kirshner, Meredith Monroe, Taye Diggs, Dominique Swain

Starring: Mia Kirshner, Meredith Monroe, Taye Diggs, Dominique Swain, Scott Bairstow, Oliver Hudson, Rachel True, Joanna Canton

Director: Zoe Clarke-Williams

Director: Zoe Clarke-Williams
Screenwriter: Victoria Strouse
Producer: Frank Mancuso
Composer: John Murphy, David A. Hughes
Studio: Sony Pictures Entertainment

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Reviews for New Best Friend

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1 - 20 (sorted by date; UK critics are listed first)
Text View | 1 2 >> >|
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The film could have done so much more -- but it just didn't.

Full Review Source: Hollywood.com | comment Comment
11/20/08
Kit Bowen
Kit Bowen
Hollywood.com

A campus drama-cum-whodunit that's obvious and exploitative even by low-bar youthpic standards.

Full Review Source: Variety | comment Comment
06/23/08
Dennis Harvey
Dennis Harvey
Variety
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

A dull, generic title for a dull, generic film.

Full Review Source: Chicago Reader | comment Comment
03/06/07
Sergio Mims
Sergio Mims
Chicago Reader

No review available.

comment Comment
09/13/05
Emanuel Levy
Emanuel Levy
EmanuelLevy.Com

New Best Friend shouldn’t have gone straight to video; it should have gone straight to a Mystery Science Theater 3000 video.

Full Review Source: Northwest Herald (Crystal Lake, IL) | comment Comment
06/10/03
Jeffrey Westhoff
Jeffrey Westhoff
Northwest Herald (Crystal Lake, IL)

Its simplicity puts an exclamation point on the fact that this isn’t something to be taken seriously, but it also wrecks any chance of the movie rising above similar fare.

Full Review Source: Apollo Guide | comment Comment
10/02/02
Ryan Cracknell
Ryan Cracknell
Apollo Guide

[Less a movie than] an appalling, odoriferous thing... so rotten in almost every single facet of production that you'll want to crawl up your own *** in embarrassment.

Full Review Source: Entertainment Today | comment Comment
08/27/02
Brent Simon
Brent Simon
Entertainment Today

Even in terms of the low-grade cheese standards on which it operates, it never quite makes the grade as tawdry trash.

Full Review Source: TheMovieReport.com | comment Comment
04/24/02
Michael Dequina
Michael Dequina
TheMovieReport.com

With Zoe Clarke-Williams's lackluster thriller "New Best Friend", who needs enemies? Just another generic drama that has nothing going for it other than its exploitive array of obligatory cheap thrills.

Full Review Source: Movie Eye | comment Comment
04/21/02
Frank Ochieng
Frank Ochieng
Movie Eye

The party scenes deliver some tawdry kicks. The rest of the film ... is dudsville.

Full Review Source: Entertainment Weekly | comment Comment
04/18/02
Owen Gleiberman
Owen Gleiberman
Entertainment Weekly

It shows that some studios firmly believe that people have lost the ability to think and will forgive any shoddy product as long as there's a little girl-on-girl action.

Full Review Source: Filmcritic.com | comment Comment
04/16/02
Pete Croatto
Pete Croatto
Filmcritic.com

Incompetent but inadvertently entertaining.

Full Review Source: eye WEEKLY | comment Comment
04/15/02
Jason Anderson
Jason Anderson
eye WEEKLY

The story wields through confusingly and often ricochets so unevenly you're downright confused as to what's up and who's where.

Full Review Source: Blunt Review | comment Comment
04/14/02
Emily Blunt
Emily Blunt
Blunt Review

The trashy teen-sleaze equivalent of Showgirls.

Full Review Source: Austin Chronicle | comment Comment
04/14/02
Marc Savlov
Marc Savlov
Austin Chronicle

Instead of trying to bust some blondes, [Diggs] should be probing why a guy with his talent ended up in a movie this bad.

Full Review Source: Toronto Star | comment Comment
04/13/02
Peter Howell
Peter Howell
Toronto Star

This film from Zoe Clarke-Williams is a most predictable regurgitation of teen peer pressure and drug misuse.

Full Review Source: Boston Phoenix | comment Comment
04/13/02
Boston Phoenix

The movie has very little to offer besides unintentional laughs.

Full Review Source: Combustible Celluloid | comment Comment
04/12/02
Jeffrey M. Anderson
Jeffrey M. Anderson
Combustible Celluloid

The angst-ridden, affluent slacker characters are more grating than engaging.

Full Review Source: Boxoffice Magazine | comment Comment
04/12/02
Michael Tunison
Michael Tunison
Boxoffice Magazine

Nobody seems to have cared much about any aspect of it, from its cheesy screenplay to the grayish quality of its lighting to its last-minute, haphazard theatrical release.

Full Review Source: Seattle Times | comment Comment
04/12/02
Moira MacDonald
Moira MacDonald
Seattle Times

Great trash, one of those mediocre movies that in its own crass way is more enjoyable than most things that get nominated for Oscars.

Full Review Source: San Francisco Chronicle | comment Comment
04/12/02
Mick LaSalle
Mick LaSalle
San Francisco Chronicle
 
 
1 - 20 (sorted by date; UK critics are listed first)
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