It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

This film starts off with a young girl, Rena Gruff, (Jena Malone) sitting on a floor and breaks a picture frame in order to cut her wrists. You also proceed to see Rena try to hang herself on a dead tree limb and her efforts fail. Rena has a half-sister named Jay Gruff who looks down on her younger sister and treats her very badly. Rena also has a brother named Jay Gruff, (Brad Renfo) who is a young boy who seems hen pecked with all the woman around him. However, he loves his mother, Madge, (Michelle Forbes) who loves her family and holds the family together. The father is in prison for killing someone and most of the family do not care very much for him at all. Rena has a deep interest in her father and wants the family to visit their father for a prison picnic and no one in the family really want to attend, but Madge changed the families minds and that is when the film takes a very interesting change and there is some dark comedy, but this film is rather depressing.

The needy teenager Rena Grubb (Jena Malone) lives with her dysfunctional family of losers in a trailer park. The most popular boy in her school is dating her only for sex, and does not want to be seen with her. Her brother Jay (Brad Renfro) is gay; her older half-sister Barbie (Alicia Witt) is a bitch; and her mother Madge (Michelle Forbes) works hard in several low-qualification jobs to raise money to support her family. Rena is asking her mother to go to the annual picnic with her beloved missing low-fife father John Grubb (Chris Mulkey), who is in prison sentenced to two life sentences. Rena is pregnant and collects the cards her father sends to her from the prison. When Madge decides to go with her family to the picnic, and along the day, the family finds how mean and nasty John is, shattering the dreams of Rena with her father."Confessions of an American Girl" is a weird movie, with a genre oscillating between a heavy drama and a very dark comedy. The cast is excellent with great performances, highlighting Jena Malone in the role of a complex needy girl that wishes to be loved and worships her father, but in the end she discovers the truth about him. Alicia Witt is extremely sexy, her character is despicable and her performance is so good that Barbie irritated me in many moments with her mean attitude. My vote is six.Title (Brazil): "Confissões de uma Garota Americana" ("Confessions of an American Girl")

Well, it means, you and your family are all losers and dumber than dirt, unfortunately.The film's central character is Rena Grubb (Jena Malone), a young teenage girl. I don't know Rena's exact age, maybe 13 or 14. She lives in a trailer park with her mother, older brother Jay, and older half-sister, Barbie. Rena's father, John, is in prison serving two life sentences.Rena is not happy. She makes several suicide attempts. Nor does she have much reason to be happy all things considered.She's being used by the popular boy in school, who doesn't even want to be seen in public with her, and then she gets pregnant by him. Her own mother's first pregnancy was at 15 - and the fruit doesn't fall far from the tree, evidently.One thing Rena is hanging onto is thoughts of her Daddy. He got sent away when she was very young, so she has only scant memories of him. She feels Daddy not being there is why things are going so badly for her and the family.Rena finally badgers her mother into all of them attending the picnic at the prison and seeing John.A whole lot of truths are revealed during that family picnic at the prison.To say much more would give too much away so I'll stop at this point, and say only that the film was excellent. It is a dark comedy at times, poignant at other times and held my interest completely.All the performers gave 100% to their roles.10 stars.

This is one of the better coming-of-age movies you probably have never seen. It's a real gem of a movie.It's not easy to watch, that's for sure. There isn't a high-functioning person in the bunch but just about all of them have some redeeming qualities.It's downright painful, at points, but even the bad characters manage to endear themselves to the viewer.I grew up in the "white trash" culture and this movie has the ring of truth, to me. The characters in this movie certainly have their counterparts in the real world I come from! When watching the movie, it never occurred to me that the director was insinuating that all low-income people or southerners are like this. Just one very interesting family.If you like to find hidden film gems, be sure to rent or TiVo "Amerian Girl." I just love these low-budget movies that are more powerful than the mega-million dollar movies.