16 Wishes - Review

Movie Review

image source: en.wikipedia.org

Title                              : 16 Wishes

Genre                           : Comedy, Fantasy, Teen

Written by                    : Annie DeYoung

Directed by                  : Peter DeLuise

Original release           : June 25, 2010 (US)

  July 16, 2010 (CAN)

16 wishes is a Canadian-American movie directed by Peter DeLuise. It was released on June 25, 2010 in the United States. The movie tells a story about a girl who wants all of her 16 wishes to come true on her sixteenth birthday.

(Warning: there rest of this review contains spoilers)

The story starts with Abby (played by Debby Ryan) readying herself to go to school. She opened her closet where she had kept her list of wishes. There were sixteen wishes written on her list. She really hoped that all of them would come true on her sixteenth birthday.

Abby’s family gave her a surprise by bringing a birthday cake to her room. However, Abby didn’t show any excitement towards it. She said to her parents that she was already sixteen and she wasn’t a little girl anymore. She thought that she doesn’t need this kind of surprise anymore since she was already a grown up girl. Unfortunately, not long after the surprise, Abby got another surprise. Her house was attacked by a group of wasps. Because of this, Abby and her family had to move out from the house.

Still wearing her pajamas, Abby saw her neighbor and rival, Krista Cook (played by Karissa Tynes), going to school by her brand new car. Actually, both Abby and Krista had the same birthday. Abby felt so annoyed that her long awaited sixteenth birthday had turned out to be the worst.

Not only her house got attacked by the wasps, her dad’s car was also attacked by them. Because of this incident, Abby had to go to school by bus. At the bus stop, she met her best friend, Jay Kepler (played by Jean-Luc Bilodeau). Jay congratulated Abby for her 16th birthday. He gave her a necklace, which has the letters BFF engraved on it as a present.

When Abby and Jay were in the middle their talk, a passing delivery truck stopped abruptly in front of them. Then, a women named Celeste (played by Anna Mae Routledge) appears from behind its door. Dressed as a courier, she gave Abby a package then wished Abby happy birthday. After doing her job, Celeste went away, leaving Abby and Jay at the bus stop.

A feeling of curiosity tickled Abby’s mind. She tried to open the package, even though Jay had warned her that it might be a suspicious package. Abby didn’t heed to his words and opened it anyway. The package turned out to be a box of candles. On the box, there was a sentence written on it. It said, “Make a wish, light a candle, and watch your sweet 16 birthday wishes come true.” Abby thought of it as joke, but she tried it anyway. She randomly took a candle in the shape of number one, lit it up, and then she blew it. After she blew the candle, suddenly Joey Lockhart (played by Joel Semande) the famous pop star idol appeared in front of her from inside a car. He wished Abby happy birthday then kissed her cheek.

After what happened, Abby realized that the number on the candle actually corresponded to the number on her wish list. She quickly took candle number eight, lit it up, then she blew it. After the candle was blown, a red car stopped in front of her, with Celeste as the driver. Celeste said, “The car is yours.” to Abby. Then, Abby and Jay went to school by that car.

At school, Abby meets her rival, Krista Cook. Krista got irritated when she saw Abby came to school riding a new car better than hers. Abby tried to invite her friends to her birthday party, but she got laughed at instead because she was still wearing her pajama to school. Jay came to her rescue by asking her to go to the locker room so that she could change into something more appropriate.

During the school time, Abby tried to light another candle with a purpose to beat Krista, but it wouldn’t lit up. Celeste, disguised herself as a guidance councelor at school, told Abby that she could only make one wish per hour. The wishes that had been granted would be permanent when midnight came.

Abby decided to use all of her candle by following the rules. Everything was perfect for her, until she used candle number 9 which granted her wish “people will stop treating me like a child”. As a result, she really became an adult, instead of being treated as one. Physically she was an adult, but mentally she was still a 16 year old teenager. Because she had become an adult, she couldn’t enter high school anymore. Moreover, her best friend, Jay, didn’t recognize her as his best friend anymore. To make things worse, her parents told her to live on her own. She also needed to get a job so that she could pay for her bills. This was a disaster for Abby. If she couldn’t reverse this wish soon, it would become permanent at midnight. Of course, she didn’t want that.

In her desperation, Abby tried all of the remaining wishes, but all of them were useless. She even tried to change one of the wishes on her wish list to reverse the magic, but it couldn’t be erased. She was so desperate and almost gave up. She really wanted her life to go back to normal. She reflected on what she did. She really hoped that she didn’t wish for those things. Abby really regretted it. She finally realized that she should had appreciate what she already had. She tried everything until only wish was left. It was wish number sixteen, which had a photograph of Logan Buchanan (played by Keenan Tracey), her crush at school.

Fortunately, the photograph could be pulled off from the wish list. Abby quickly changed the wish into “I wish I could start this whole day over again.” It turned out that the wish came true. Abby went back to the day when she woke up on her sixteenth birthday. She felt so relieved because her life went back to normal. She even threw away her wish list to a trash can.

In the end, Abby made a peace with Krista. They even celebrated their sixteenth birthday party together. What’s more, Abby and Jay ended up together, more than being best friends. Abby was so glad because she learned that she already had everything that she could ever wanted.

In my opinion, 16 wishes is a good movie. The actors and actress played their role well in the movie. Abby is character that has a good character development. She started as a typically annoying and wishful teenager, but through the progress of the story, she became a girl that can respect her current life.

This movie gives a strong moral value that we have to appreciate what we already have now before all of it gets taken away from us. We might not realize that what we already have today might be the best thing that we have. We have to refrain ourselves for asking too much things in our live, moreover if the things are not really necessary. In short, we have to be grateful of what we already have.

Aside from its good side, there is one thing that I feel a bit uncomfortable about this movie. This move was actually premiered on Disney Channel. From what I’ve known so far, Disney Channel’s audience are mostly children and teenager. There is a scene in the movie that shows two teenagers kissing. I think, this is not good since the audience of Disney Channel are mostly still under-aged.

Overall, 16 wishes is movie worth watching. I would recommend this movie to everyone who wants to watch a movie with a light story, yet has a deep moral value within it. I hope that anyone who read my review will find it helpful and will be interested to watch the movie.