Maybe Hilary Duff's split from Disney was a good thing after all. Sure, Lizzie's debut feature about a class trip to Rome made a totally cool! (insert giggles here) $42 million at the box office, and conjures a sparkling glitterscape of tween dreams that would make Tinkerbell beam. Die-hard Duffites will also relish The Lizzie McGuire Movie's goody bag of DVD extras, like the making-of short in which the starlet gushes over how ''creative'' the on-location shoot was.
But Lizzie's Big Adventure is so loyal to its small-screen source (the series' actors all reprise their roles here) that the movie plays like an ABC Family flick stretched bare to fit the big screen. Duff is charming, no doubt, but her energy is flattened by such two-dimensional, sitcomy crutches as f-f-forced st-st-stuttering to convey the entire emotional spectrum. Just let the girl cut loose, already! And really, is there anyone out there who still buys the perfectly coiffed, lip-glossed, and hip-huggered Duff as an awkward, unpopular teen? That idea is so over the Hil.
