Cierra Ramirez: Patricia Arquette

Eva Mendes Dept: The strong, sexy presence of Eva Mendes and the girlish perkiness of Cierra Ramirez can only go so far to make the forced mother-daughter dramedy "Girl in Progress" tolerable, according to Winnipeg Free Press. Breaking down and sending up a specific genre is fine if the script is strong enough to get away with such cutesy self-reference, as in "Juno" and "Easy A." Director Patricia Riggen and screenwriter Hiram Martinez don't go far enough, don't dig deep enough with these characters. They play it too safe, which makes "Girl in Progress" feel like a slightly racier version of an ABC Family show and the flat, overly bright lighting further makes it feel like forgettable television and in this film image released by Pantelion Films, Patricia Arquette, left, and Cierra Ramirez are shown in a scene from "Girl in Progress." AP Photo/Pantelion Films, Bob Akester It's a coming-of-age story that knows it's a coming-of-age story as in, our young heroine is well aware of the conventions of this kind of tale and goes out of her way to manufacture various rites of passage to expedite her transformation from innocence to womanhood. Ramirez's character, the teenage Ansiedad, literally creates a flow chart in her bedroom and spells out her strategy with her only friend the sweetly nerdy Raini Rodriguez whom she'll soon cast aside, she declares, because it's a necessary step in the process. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.