Although this movie is an “oldie” it’s a must watch. I had not watched it until a couple months back when I saw it on Disney plus, and ever since then I’ve been hooked. I rewatched this so many times I’ve lost count and even more when I introduced it to my sister who probably watches it more than I do with her bi-daily movie runs.

This movie was directed by Gil Junger best known for “10 Things I hate About You.” The cast includes the iconic Heath Ledger who played the iconic Joker. In this film, he plays the main male lead, Patrick Verona, alongside actress Julia Stiles, also known as, Kat Stratford in this romantic comedy.

While doing research on the director I found out that “10 Things I Hate About You” is adapted from William Shakespears’ “The Taming of the Shrew”. That explains all the William Shakespeare references in the movie with Kats best friend Mandella, played by Susan May Pratt, and her boyfriend Michael, played by David Krumholtz. Mandella is obsessed with William Shakespeare so when she was asked out by her secret admirer with a note addressed to her with a quote from Shakespeare and signed by William she was excited and since she doesn’t know who it is she would call him William. They went to prom together as William and Mary. 

Even after watching it so many times it never fails to make me laugh. Especially when Patrick asks Kat to prom and he’s on the bleachers singing “I love you baby” by Surf Mesa, with the school band playing out on the field while simultaneously running away from the school’s security guards, still singing as they drag him out and Kat plans to get him out of detention.

The whole movie is about Kat’s younger sister conspiring with Joey Donner, Andrew Keegan, to get her sister to go to prom because of her dads rule. The rule is if Kat doesn’t go, neither can she. This makes everyone question, how were they going to take Kat, the sister that hates everyone and everything, to prom? Easy, pay someone else to take her. And they did exactly that.

Joey is a popular boy in school who is also a model. He used his money to pay but it isn’t a job he’s willing to do himself. He consulted with two other guys Michael and the new kid in school Cameron James, played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt. They were the ones to convince Patrick to accept the mission. Little did he know that Cameron was using this as an opportunity to get with Joey’s date, Bianca Stratford, played by, Larisa Oleynik. Michael and Cameron’s job is to find everything about Kat and report it to Patrick so he could use it on their dates. Patrick ends up falling in love with Kat, but how would Kat react when she finds out their conspiring right when she is also falling for him?

I was talking about this movie with one of my friends who never watched it but knew the famous “10 things I Hate About You” poem Kat writes and presents to her class at the end of the movie. This shows how known it is among people although it is a bit sad that there are plenty of people in the world today who  know the poem but not where it’s from. Hopefully, this review will push them to watch it and enjoy it just like I did.