“She’s The Man” reviewed by Shauna Whitmore

She’s The Man is a funny, yet inspirational movie that shows that if someone sets their mind to something, they can achieve it.

The first time I watched this movie, I never noticed how Viola showed leadership by doing what most women wouldn’t dare to do, and by doing this, she took a stand against what she believed was right, and made a difference.

Viola is the main character in the movie, and her one love is soccer. When she goes to try out for her school’s soccer team and finds out it has been cut due to not enough females have signed up, she is crushed. Determined to be able to play soccer, she goes and talks to the guy’s soccer coach about trying out for his team. He says that women are not as strong, fast and skilled as men and that is why they cannot try out for his team. Viola feels hopeless until she found out that her brother is leaving the country to play in his band and he needs her to cover for him at school. She gets a make over that makes her look similar to her brother, and since her twin brother was supposed to be attending a new school where no one knows him, she would go unnoticed. Dressed up as her brother she goes and tries out for the school’s soccer team and is hurt when she finds out she only made second strings. She works extremely hard to better herself and proves to the coach that she is strong enough to be a first string player, and is able to play at their first game against her previous school which turned her down.  During that game she admits to everyone that she has been pretending to be her brother, because that’s how important the sport is to her. The other team’s coach wants them to forfeit the game since it is strictly only a men’s league of soccer. Viola’s coach responds by saying “we do not discriminate based on gender,” and they continue to play the game, which Viola scored the winning goal in, to prove that girls can do anything guys can do.

Leadership:

Viola shows leadership by going after what she wants more than anything. She plays on a soccer team that is strictly just for men and proves that she is good enough and opens that door for other women who want to do the same. She goes through many challenging obstacles but in the end, she comes out stronger than she ever was before.

Gender Issues:

Gender issues are very pronounced in sports, they are not many sports in which males and females play together on the same team, and this movie brings that point up.  Viola doesn’t understand why it would be such a problem for her to play on the guy’s soccer team, and because of being rejected from that, she was to pretend to be her twin brother. Since she wins the game against the team that rejected her, she proves that she is as good as the guys and that teams shouldn’t discriminate based on gender.