“… pretty much the epitome of a guilty pleasure movie.”

So yesterday one of my friends made me watch Spice World, the comedy film starring the Spice Girls. As for what this movie is about, I can’t really say. I mean it’s about the Spice Girls, but apart form that I’m completely lost in terms of the plot or point of this film. Either way, let’s jump into it.

Spice World might be one of the worst movies I have ever seen. I struggle to think of one thing about this movie that I can spin as a positive. First of all, the plot was all over the place. I think it was about a tour, but all I know for sure is that everyone was on a bus for the entire movie. What I also know for sure is the fact that there is no way that the inside of that bus was big enough for the set that they used for the inside of the bus. I also know that none of the Spice Girls can act for shit. Watching this movie was pretty painful at times, and that was solely for the acting chops of the main characters. Also, the musical numbers in the film felt very forced. I know that Spice World isn’t a musical in the traditional sense, but the way that the characters would break out into full songs felt really out of place. But despite all of this, I kind of loved the movie.

Spice World caught me off guard with its abundance of absurdist humour. It’s like the people involved with the movie understood that it was shit, so they decided to have some fun with it. I mean it when I say that some of the jokes in this movie were brilliantly written. They were clever, with just enough meta humour to appease even the most cynical of moviegoers. And on top of this there is a lot of commentary on Hollywood, stardom, and the Spice World movie itself. All of this added to the surreal feel that the movie had. The entire time I didn’t know if I was watching an earnest attempt that turned out to be shitty, or a tongue-in-cheek attempt at lampooning the pop-culture craze at the time. Either way Spice World was pretty enjoyable throughout. And with all of the cameos in the movie, you really can’t go wrong with watching it to try and spot all of the ridiculously famous musicians and comedians that lent their time to be a part of Spice World.

All of this doesn’t excuse how shitty Spice World was, but I will say that it is an oddly enjoyable time. Spice World is pretty much the epitome of a guilty pleasure movie.

I give Spice World a B