Analysis of a teen angst film - Wild Child

Wild Child stars Emma Roberts playing Poppy Moore, the rich, spoilt Malibu girl who does everything to test her often absent father's temper. She is known to be a rebel since the passing of her mother. After one final party where Poppy throws her fathers new lovers clothes into the ocean off of their infinity pool, her father decides its time to ship her off to a private English boarding school. Poppy goes to Abbey Mount, the school, with every intention to get kicked out and sent straight back to Malibu with her rich friends and designer brands.

Poppy is firstly portrayed as an antagonist, especially towards Kate, the girl who has been assigned as her 'big sister' at the school and has been asked to show her the ropes, however Kate's caring affectionate personality helps to make sure she is lovely to Poppy

no matter what, and her and her fellow roommates befriend Poppy.

Kate and her friends teach Poppy that the only way to get out of Abbey mount is to do something huge to upset the headmistress, or a series of bad events. Poppy is confused when the dorm adviser confiscates every ones phones and the girls give over 'dinosaur' phones compared to hers. However she soon realises their smart plans when they get their actual phones out after she has left. Poppy becomes rivals with the head girl Harriet and her followers, the real antagonists of the film but plays many pranks with her new found friends. 

While playing for the school Lacrosse team, a sport Poppy finds herself very good at, Poppy discovers that Abbey mount is the school her mother once attended before she had Poppy.

The girls come to a loss when none of the pranks

seem to be working but think of one final idea, to seduce the headmistress' son, Freddie, who is strictly off limits. Poppy and the girls attend a school dance where Poppy trips and hits her head, Freddie takes her outside to get some air where he confesses he likes her and asks to take her out on a date. Poppy thoroughly enjoys the date but comes back to a complete disaster when she finds her friends reading an email she supposedly wrote to her friends back in Malibu claiming how much she hated everyone at this school including her roommates and new found friends. The girls therefore start ignoring Poppy and she finds out Freddie has received this information as well making him ignore her too.

Feeling lost and alone Poppy sneaks down to the cook's room where she uses a phone to ring Ruby, her best friend in Malibu. However this leaves her feeling even more awful after Poppy hears Ruby stating how much she dislikes Poppy and how she is sleeping with Poppy's boyfriend. Feeling completely alone Poppy is playing with her lighter, still in the cook's room, and sets a curtain alight, hearing footsteps she puts this fire out before rushing back to her room without getting caught but accidentally leaving behind her 'i love LA' lighter. Looking out the window minutes later she See's fire and wakes up the whole school alerting them. Realising Drippy, one of the girls, is missing everyone starts to panic Poppy realises where she is and rushes back into the burning building to help her escape. She begins to be seen as the protagonist in the film but everyone is still upset with her for the email. When the fire has been put out Freddie, who found the lighter, returns it to Poppy to stop her getting in trouble but refuses to let her tell him what happened. Although Poppy has suddenly realised she does not want to leave she goes to the headmistress and confesses to the fire. 

The disappointed teacher tells Poppy she will have to attend the honour court, a court within the school where the students decide on the punishment. While she waits for this to happen Freddie finds her crying and is in the end convinced that the fire was an accident and Poppy did not mean for this to happen. While Poppy is in the court her friends discover it was not her who sent the email and go to the court to defend her, this makes Harriett accidentally confess to restarting the fire in an angry attempt to turn everyone against Poppy. 

Poppy is forgiven by all her friends and is seen in the Lacrosse finals, her Dad attends this match and is so shocked to see how much she has changed, in her appearance as well as her personality, but also how much she looks like her mother. At the end of the film we see Poppy with her new friends and Freddie sitting by the pool in her Malibu home, she is ignoring Ruby's calls now she knows she is not the friend she once thought she was. The film ironically ends with the group stood about to jump off the cliff into the Pacific ocean, the same jump that sent her to the school in the first place. 

This movie attracted a large audience in my opinion, as many viewers felt they were living their dream through Poppy. They get thrills out of her being rebellious and are given a ‘false’ view of boarding school life, like Mean girls it also contained experiences that the target audience can relate to, such as teen arguments, and heartbreak.