Uglies, streaming on Netflix since Sept. 13, is a film adaptation of Scott Westerfeld’s best-selling book series. The first of four novels, the basis for the film, follows Tally Youngblood, a 15-year-old girl in a postmodern society that claims to have solved all of humanity’s problems (discrimination, climate crisis) with a mandatory operation that makes everyone pretty the day they turn 16.
Tally meets Shay, a girl who wants to escape the “Transformation” by running away to a community called the Smoke. Tally is tasked by a member of her government’s Special Circumstances to find Shay and expose the location of the Smoke. When Tally arrives at the Smoke, she learns that her city’s government is damaging everyone’s brains and essentially inhibiting their free will, and she decides she wants to help the Smoke in testing a cure.
As a fan of Westerfeld’s series (as in I’ve read all four books 12 times through), this movie was a letdown. The 102-minute run-time, on the extremely short end for the dystopian genre, limited the film’s ability to truly immerse the viewer into the fictional world. I’m not sitting here begging for more, per se, but there was simply not enough time to connect with the characters in any meaningful way, and the movie suffered because of it. It felt rushed, choppy, and shallow, and it failed to depict the personal growth Tally experiences during her journey to the Smoke and her time there as a member of the community. It felt impossible to empathize with the characters, and the dialogue was poorly written. The biggest offense was the cliche and terrible, “Look at me, don’t do this, this isn’t you,” speech that has, for some reason, become commonplace in young adult media.
The special effects were, quite frankly, laughable. In the book series, the Pretties are described as having enchanting features and beauty, unattainable and unnatural. Rather than having an uncanny valley effect in the movies, they look like they slapped an Instagram filter on the actors and called it a day. They just aren’t as convincing as real people with surgical enhancements; they scream low-effort editing.
I also wasn’t a fan of the portrayal of the Pretty side of the city in the film. After her best friend, Peris, undergoes the Transformation, Tally sneaks across the river to find him and stumbles upon a pig mask. The Pretty side is supposed to feel magical, not actually be so, but when she tries the costume piece on, it seems to turn her into a Pretty and change her clothes while everything sparkles. It felt like a stretch of the science fiction genre to me. In the book, the mask is just that – a mask that hides her “ugly” face and allows her to blend in with the other partygoers. Overall, the effects and imagery were gaudy and distracting; Pretty life, to an Ugly, is all glitz and glamor, but there’s something off about it, too. In the film, it all felt over-the-top.
I’m not a full-time hater, though, there were some things in the film I liked. The film does follow the plotline of the book pretty closely, save Peris’ becoming a Special under Dr. Cable’s command and David rescuing Tally from the fire, though I do understand that choice was likely made to further the mandatory romantic subplot. The Rusty Ruins, the remnants of former society, were visually very similar to what I had imagined, as were the hoverboards. I appreciated the nods to small details in the book like Spagbol, the dehydrated meal Tally consumes on her journey to the Smoke, the fireworks over the city, and the cryptic directions left by Shay, though I wish they’d been able to capture more of Tally’s struggle to decode them. In the book, deciphering these clues lets the reader in on Shay and Tally’s friendship and helps Tally learn to value herself outside of her appearance.
My advice? If you like dystopias and teen angst, read the books. The movie is generic, and I can’t think of anything that sets it apart. It caused me to cringe at several moments, and the message about self-acceptance, inner beauty, and self-worth was never deeper than the surface level. The main themes of the movie were always explicitly stated, rather than implied by the narrative, and completely lacked the nuance that was apparent in the books. I’m glad the movie was made, and I enjoyed getting to see the story play out on screen, but I can’t say I’ll be watching it 12 times, or even two.
