Teen queen from hell is one Fox-y lady

"Jennifer's Body" finds Megan Fox again exploring the subject of transformation.

No robots this time. It's Fox herself who transforms, playing a predatory teen queen who acquires occult powers and turns into an actual killer.

A teen queen from hell, quite literally.

That's screenwriter Diablo Cody's opening gambit, and Fox does her best to fill the bill. She plays Jennifer, gorgeous cheerleader and tyrant who survives a saloon fire only to be kidnapped and sacrificed by the Satan-worshipping bar band (some indie bands will do anything to achieve the success of Maroon 5 - a sample of the snarky Cody humor that peppers the script).

Jennifer becomes a succubus - a creature, we're told, that must feed on human prey to survive. And to look really good. Eating human flesh gives Jennifer better skin, more body and bounce in her hair.

"Body" aims for the knowing, tongue-in-cheek horror of the "Scream" series, and also for the pitch-black teen comedy of "Heathers." These are difficult tones to find and maintain, and "Body" neither locates nor keeps them. The movie is plagued by clumsy staging, and its attitude is all over the map.

The movie fails in other fundamental ways. Cody and director Karyn Kusama do a poor job of defining Jennifer's character in the early going, so it's hard to measure how she changes/devolves. And although much rides on Jennifer's relationship with her BFF (Amanda Seyfried), the movie doesn't establish much of a bond there, so it's hard to feel like there's much at stake (pardon the pun) when it deteriorates, leading to their ultimate, "Carrie"-ish confrontation.

Certainly, the bloody finale carries far less weight than their brief, entirely gratuitous kissing scene, one that teen boys everywhere will expect to be more fully explored in the director's cut.