If I were to join a sorority, I could only hope to have Shelley as my house mother. She’s witty, vivacious, and big-hearted. Most importantly, her closest is full of clothing that some more daring girls would love to own and, let’s face it; many guys would pray to see girls wear.

Anna Faris stars as Shelley, the over-the-top perky Playboy bunny who gets kicked out of Hugh Hefner’s mansion the day after her 27th birthday—which, according to bunny years, is equivalent to 59-years-old. With no place to live, Shelley becomes a house mother for Zeta Alpha Zeta — a nerd-filled sorority in need of 30 pledges to avoid being kicked off campus.

“The House Bunny” is a combination of “Legally Blonde” (both movies are penned by Karen McCullah Lutz & Kirsten Smith) and “Mean Girls”. It’s full of jocks and nerds; the in-crowd and the not-so-in-crowd. The storyline and the characters are neither original nor creative and yes, we all have seen such movies dozens of times.

But this movie has something that the other cookie-cutter movies don’t always have. Super cool characters.

Emma Stone, best known for her role in “Superbad”, stars as Natalie—the head of Zeta’s sisterhood. She’s smart and clever and socially awkward—just like all the other Zeta’s seven members. However, in order to make the social rejects into social goddesses, Shelley must strip them of everything — including their intelligence and clothing— and make them over to multiple versions of herself. Yes, I know, we have seen this before. Once again, the message is sent out that ALL college guys prefer women who are barely dressed and act stupid over those who aren’t afraid to out-wit them in clothing that’s not easily mistaken for lingerie.

But wait, there is hope for mankind. Oliver, played by Colin Hanks, is labelled a weirdo for actually liking a female for her brains and, of course, he also happens to be Shelley’s love interest. But just like her Zeta sisters, Shelley too must undergo a bit of transformation in order to show Oliver there is more to her than her 8-inch heels and mini skirts.

Although this Happy Madison film sends out more futile messages than anything useful, it isn’t meant to be something more. It succeeds at its purpose of entertaining the audience and much of this laugh-out-loud humour is due to Faris. She made us laugh in the “Scary Movie” franchise and she made us chuckle when she played the not-so-smart surrogate mother for Monica’s and Chandler’s babies in “Friends.” Faris will likely continue playing the “dumb blonde” roles and thankfully so because she knows how to charm the audience. Without or without bunny ears.






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