Hey Hey It's Esther Blueburger

Not a newer movie, I found this on the Kanopy streaming site via my public library's subscription.

The featured character is Danielle Catanzariti as 13-yr-old Jewish girl Esther Blueburger. She has a twin brother but his story doesn't come into play much. Both teens are going through typical changes that accompany hormone changes.

Esther is pretty much an outcast at her private school and after a chance encounter with a girl attending the local public school Esther decides she will go there too. No transfer, no registration, just borrow school clothes and start attending.

The movie is very entertaining, young Danielle Catanzariti is really very good in her role. (As an aside she is also a talented singer, doing "Sometimes" as one of the songs on the soundtrack.) Her decisions make for some interesting and mostly unexpected turns of events, and kept my attention for the entire running time.

Good movie!

This movie was brilliant! I think what deterred some of the other reviewers here was that they thought it was a children's movie. While it does have 13 year-old girls as the centre characters, trying to fit in and grow up in and out of their school lives, it is definitely not for children.

Believe it or not, I found peculiar things like social-economics to be key parts, as the difference between Sunni and Esther is never looked at directly, but determines Sunni's character and her upset with Esther. It also looks at different types of friendships, family religion and the way we lash out at people for trivial things like *we* having hurt *them*.

I didn't realise it was one of those movies that you either love or hate, but perhaps it is. A must-see, though if you're expecting a light-hearted comedy simply about fitting in, you'll be surprised - it goes into so much more depth than that

A sweet coming of age film from Australia, filmed entirely on set in Adelaide.

Toni Collette was unexpectedly beautiful with minimal makeup "on stage". She usually seems to (last example was her exemplary performances on the acclaimed series, United States of Tara (2009-2011))- but must have especially had fun in this role.

Many strange occurrences left unexplained and things presented as if this is the way it always has been. Also needed more background and backstory; one thing I really wish they explained because it could have made a spectacular side story is what have her the inspiration for her Blueburger "name poem introduction". After all, if it really was merely fumbling in her mind to fill in the blanks, how could she have received it a second time during the penultimate scene in front of the entire school, nearly identically? There was no poster is the room, flashback, etcetera, like there usually would be, inserted during its creation.

Unfortunately, there was an overall inability to consistently hold an audience's interest. Unevenly edited. Many characters were archetypal, cliches, or, frankly, unrealistic caricatures surprisedly representing your equivalent to the high school crowd.

This film did have some excellent musical choices; even mix of classical-including choir and religious- and modern pop to rock with meaningful lyrics. Predictable coming of age story, with the typical be true to who you are, fitting in, struggling to decide who your friends are, learning that being popular is not all there is in life, loyalty to worthwhile family members and true friends. Stand out exploration of early mental health and having to deal with grieving.

Lead actress Danielle Catanzariti was chosen in an open audition for this debut role, bolstered by genuine performances by Keisha Castle-Hughes (Whale Rider fame) and veteran actress Toni Collette.

There are a limited number of decent Australian films easily available in America and this was a pleasure to watch, even though- not quite there in a couple qualities- it packed what it took to be an amazing film.

Hey Hey it's Esther Blueburger is a cool flick telling the story of a young teenage girl's attempts to fit in. Esther, played wonderfully by the pixie like Danielle Cantanzariti, is trapped in a life of non-recognition by an idiosyncratic family and the lonely side of classic school yard tribal exclusion that everyone has experienced.

After befriending local girl Sunni, (Keisha Castle Hughes of Whale Rider fame), Blueburger begins a double life that is both laugh out loud funny and touching as she looks for her place in the world.

I saw Danielle & Keisha at the Sydney premiere and they are even cuter in person than on film. Danielle, although diminutive in size, projects large on screen & Keisha has a certain star power, especially on camera, which is undeniable. It's amazing that both Keisha (in Whale Rider) and Danielle in 'Esther' have been plucked from obscurity to give such fantastic debut performances especially seeing as both were in their early teens at the time. They are supported ably by their on screen parents (Essie Davis & Russell Dykstra) and Sunni's mum, Toni Colette who plays a character which is the anti-thesis of Esther's 'normal' parents, a source of fascination & enchantment for Esther.

There's something about wanting to be in with the cool kids and the lengths we go to to do that that we all recognise. It's part of growing up and becoming the person you are. That's what makes this film funny, beautiful, and sad at the same time.

This is an excellent film by first time writer & director Cathy Randall & I loved it. It's great to see talented writers and film-makers in Australia being given a chance & supported in an industry where much talent goes unnoticed and is usually substituted for 'celebrity'. It's definitely one of the better films to come out of Australia in recent years. Do yourself a favour and see this film. It's definitely not 'normal'!

This is billed as a story about a young Jewish girl and her struggle for acceptance - i.e. the typical high school movie.

I had a favourable overall impression of the film. It was very cute in a lot of places, cringe-worthy in others, with a few moments of humour interjected. I found that there was authenticity in a lot of the small things that I could relate to from my own experiences - the uniform checks, the singing of the school song, how we made out with the boys.

But as another reviewer said, the vast majority of the characters in this film were caricatures of certain types: the uptight mother, the bitchy classmate, the fat kid who got picked on, the friend's mother who is the exact opposite of Esther's mother... a lot of it seemed very contrived and fake.

The opening of the film was rather brilliantly done; Esther watching upon the sheep-like choreography of her school classmates as they gathered for lunch. It kept at this high all through the first act; we could relate to Esther and her troubles - who else flushed with embarrassment as she approached the "popular" girls with invites to her bar mitzvah? I was especially impressed with how quickly Esther could get a story out or parrot off something she had heard earlier.

It was when she met Sunni after the bar mitzvah that things went slowly downhill, starting slow but rapidly spiralling towards the end of the film. My initial impression of Sunni is that she was in Year 12 - she certainly looked like it. So the resulting events of sneaking out of private school to attend class as a Swedish exchange student at the public school really jarred uncomfortably. I don't know of a girls-only public school anyway. It was ..a little too far fetched.

At this point, I lost all sympathy for Esther. As she parrots off sentences from other people, she began to parrot off attitudes of Sunni's friends. Beating up the fat kid for her raincoat was a real low. Kudos to the characterisation of Sunni to be equally disgusted at her actions.

I couldn't figure out the relevance of Sunni's mum's death or the blow job in the street. I didn't think it lent anything to the story at all. Sunni's appearance at the private school was equally unexplainable, as was the presence of her grandmother (?) and Esther's mother. Then Esther standing up to the crowd to say her poem, with the prefects and the teachers standing agape... I didn't get that either. That whole scene was too staged for my liking, as if they just needed something to show that Esther was going back to her likable, quirky self. Anti-climactic is what I would describe it. It soured the entire movie for me.