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ON TELEVISION

Disney Channel
"Rip Girls" airs on the Disney Channel this month. Cast members,
from left, are Meleana White, Hawaii's Stacie Hess, Camilla Belle,
Brian Christopher Stark and Kanoa Chung.

Reality left out of
Disney surf film

By Tim Ryan
Star-Bulletin

RIP Girls," Disney Channel's movie about surfing teen-agers, tells its targeted young audience to have the power of their convictions and that family is more important than money, even though dad isn't right much of the time.

Director Martha Coolidge's portrayal of teen-age angst and how this young group interacts in Hawaii is mostly shibai. (The setting is supposed to be "a glorious Hawaiian island;" actually it's Queensland, Australia.)

Sydney (Camilla Belle), a sheltered 13-year-old girl, returns to her native Hawaii for the first time since she was a small child to claim her inheritance, a historical house set on acres of pristine beachfront property. But she's faced with the difficult decision of selling the plantation to land developers -- the two real estate agents here are purely cliche -- or keeping the property and convincing her overprotective father, Ben, and step-mother, Elizabeth, to move from their Chicago home to the island.

Rip Girls: At 7:30 and 9:05 p.m. tomorrow, 7 p.m. Monday and Wednesday, 8:30 p.m. April 28 and 1 p.m. April 30, Disney Channels

Dad -- played by Dwier Brown -- is stiff, wimpy, unsympathetic and without a clue as to how to relate to his kid. Hmmm ... maybe this is real life.

One of the stipulations in the will is that Sydney must stay in the house for two weeks to get her inheritance.

So here we go: In quick order, Sydney feels a spiritual connection to the house and land; meets and is readily accepted by the locals at the surfing beach on the property; takes up surfing using the board her biological mother, "an island native," was riding when she drowned.

Disney Channel
Among the surfers who befriend Sydney are, from left, Mele
(Meleana White), Kai (Kanoa Chung)and Gia, (Stacie Hess).

(One of her Sydney's new friends is former Makakilo resident Stacie Hess who co-stars as Gia. Hess, who wrote Rant & Rave columns for this paper, is now living in Los Angeles, has appeared in a national commercial for Guess Jeans and locals ads for Lt. Gov. Mazie Hirono.)

Enter Daddy Ben.

Fearing for his daughter's safety, he forbids her to go surfing without telling her that her mother had drowned. But you can go to the beach to watch, he says.

Sydney is thrilled, then sneaks the surfboard to the beach anyway. Bad girl!

Sydney decides she likes the land, the history, the locals and especially a haole skateboarder. Ah, now Sydney has second thoughts about selling anything.

Then she learns that all these new friends were a setup -- even Gia. The group just doesn't want Sydney to sell the land and their beach.

When they think she's selling anyway, they desert her.

Poor Sydney is sooo confused.

When it comes time to sign the contract, she just can't go through with it. She wants to find Gia to tell her.

Guess what? Gia's wiped out big time and Sydney sees her friend's arm above the surface. She grabs Gia's board, which has washed ashore, and grabs Gia just as she slips below the surface.

As Gia comes around, Sydney tells her the news. She's not only not selling the land, Sydney and her family are staying in Hawaii.

If only life really imitated art.

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