It has always been a lifelong dream of mine to be a hot girl in a bikini waving a gun around on the beach, so of course I was all in to check out Harmony Korine’s (writer of “Kids”) new trip of a movie, “Spring Breakers.” Starring two ex-Disney queens (Selena Gomez as innocent, sweet Faith and Vanessa Hudgens as bad-girl Candy), it’s a contemporary sister to Sofia Coppola’s lovely but vague “Marie Antoinette.” With drug lords, boobs and beer bongs.
Korine’s film is more fantasy than reality; the four friends rob a restaurant to escape their dreary town and be part of the debauchery that is the classic American spring break. While there, all but Gomez’s Faith connect with their dark sides and spend most of the movie in bikinis holding up hotel rooms alongside James Franco’s sleazy white-boy rapper/gangbanger Alien, a Kevin Federline lookalike with a mouthful of grills and some mad cheesy cornrows. (The best scene of the entire movie is when Alien and his girls go on a violent spree set to Britney Spears’ classic ballad “Everytime.”)
Though it deals with ugly subject matter, “Spring Breakers” is a pretty movie. The girls are beautiful in their skimpy day-glo bikinis and shot in syrupy, hazy light as though Korine has been doing bong hits alongside them. In fact, I spent most of the movie gleaning beauty tips. Here’s what I learned about beauty from “Spring Breakers.”
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If you’re going to rob a restaurant, it’s probably best to tuck your pink hair inside your mask because it’s an easy identifier, duh. Cotty, played by Korine’s wife Rachel, wears a cotton-candy shade with grown-out roots throughout the movie. Trendy!
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Stay-all-day eyeliner is a must for your spring break trip. Whatever the girls are using lasts through a dip in the hotel pool and an overnight stay in jail. Smudgy old liner is sexy and alluring, like you’ve been up for days doing cocaine off your friend’s boobs.
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The secret to perfect beachy waves is chlorine and party sweat. Candy’s (Hudgens) dark blonde waves are flawlessly messy throughout the movie, even when she’s boning Alien in a three-way in the pool. Her main partner in crime and threesomes Brit (Ashley Benson of “Pretty Little Liars”) rocks the trendy, Karlie Kloss-endorsed Chop. Benson’s features are so petite and delicate that she’s terrifying as a cold-hearted criminal.
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James Franco has a lot of fun wearing a grill. He delights in playing with it, hamming it up as Alien. Without those grills I don’t think he would’ve been half as nasty. Oh, and Alien wears Calvin Klein Escape cologne.
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You can’t cover up Gucci Mane’s ice cream tattoo. Did I mention the rapper is in “Spring Breakers”? He plays drug lord king Archie, Alien’s ex-best friend who’s out to off him. That trademark tattoo is in place on his cheek even when he’s in character. You can’t cover up Gucci Mane with HD makeup!
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Even actresses with “perfect” beach bodies have cellulite. Yeah, I looked. I’m sorry. Blame the media. That said, all four girls look perfectly collegiate and all-American in those bikinis. (That’s basically all they wear throughout the entire movie. Envious.)
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Burning question: Exactly where do you keep your luminizer and lip gloss in said bikini, Selena Gomez? Also, even though you don’t get naked and leave halfway through the movie, you make me uncomfortable because you look perpetually 15.
“Spring Breakers” will probably be inspiring to teen girls on Tumblr too, which is a little scary. (Who am I kidding; I’m a teen girl at heart even though I’m a 25-year-old lady.) As long as they’re taking beauty tips from the foursome and not learning how to pack a pistol, that should be OK.