Daria the Movie

Daria the Movie is a full-length screenplay written by Aaron Solomon (ben Saul Joseph) Adelman and Barry Eshkol Adelman in fall of 1999. It was preceded by The Unofficial Daria Movie Rumor Page, which began as early as August 1998.

Background

The authors posed the question: What would happen if Hollywood's most hated director met MTV's best cartoon? The answer was a live-action Daria movie directed by Joel Schumacher, in which many liberties were taken.

Summary

Warning: The following may contain plot or ending details.

Daria Morgendorffer, the only child of Amy Barksdale-Morgendorffer and Keith Morgendorffer, lives a normal existence in Highland, Texas... until learning that her parents have died from falling on a cow while sky diving. Daria is then sent to live with her cousin, Lynn Quinn Michaelis, and her aunt and uncle, Helen and Jake Michaelis in Lawndale.

From there, the movie loosely follows several early episodes from the television series, including "Esteemsters," "The Invitation," "The Lab Brat," and "Road Worrier." Daria meets Jane in a self-esteem class and quickly becomes enamored of her brother, Trent. She and Trent grow closer at Brittany's party, but Quinn (who has designs on Trent herself), does everything in her power to keep them apart, creating conflict after conflict. After the Fashion Club sabotages Daria and Mystik Spiral at the school talent show, Daria rebounds by reciting a Melody Powers story, beating Quinn's "Academic Imprisonment" essay to win first prize. Finally, Sandi ups the stakes: Quinn can be Fashion Club president if she successfully breaks up Daria and Trent. Quinn arranges for Upchuck to blackmail Daria into a date at Chez Pierre, where Trent catches her. They break up, and Daria gets revenge by dressing and acting like Quinn, stealing her boyfriends, and spreading vicious rumors intended to wreck her reputation.

Daria gets in a fight with Jane over her break up with Trent, only to receive a ghostly visit from her mother, who advises her on how they can get back together. Daria decides to use a reporter's visit to Lawndale High (for her "My So-Called Angst" essay) to make amends with Jane and Trent while exposing the "mean girls" underside of the school. Every bad thing Sandi and Quinn have ever done is dug up and exposed, destroying them both. Realizing that Daria was just a victim of Quinn's scheme, Trent forgives her for being with Upchuck.

Characters

• Daria Morgendorffer = Jennifer Love-Hewitt
• Lynn Quinn Michaelis = Keri Russell
• Helen Michaelis = Gates McFadden
• Jake Michaelis = John Travolta
• Amy Barksdale-Morgendorffer = Janeane Garofalo
• Jane Lane = Christina Ricci
• Trent Lane = Jakob Dylan
• Jesse Moreno = Leonardo DiCaprio
• Andrea Flynn = Rose McGowan
• Sandi Griffin = Denise Richards
• Tiffany Blum-Deckler = Alyson Hannigan
• Stacy Rowe = Reese Whitherspoon
• Upchuck Ruttheimer = Jonathan Taylor Thomas
• Brittany Taylor = Melissa Joan Hart
• Kevin Thompson = Joey Lawrence
• Ted DeWitt-Clinton = Taylor Hanson
• Val = Alicia Silverstone

Trivia

• Daria rarely wears her trademark glasses during the movie.
• Most of the scenes from Brittany's party come from the Jennifer Love-Hewitt movie, Can't Hardly Wait (1998).
• Daria the Movie was a strong influence on Kara Wild's Abruptly Amy fanfiction series.

External Links

Archive of The Unofficial Daria Movie Rumor Page

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