Gimme Shelter

For what it’s worth, Vanessa Hudgens seems to have separated herself from her Disney past once and for all thanks to a real-deal performance in Gimme Shelter. She plays Apple, a teen runaway, pregnant, without hope and maybe beyond reclamation. There’s not a hint of High School Musical to be found, and if you didn’t know about her childhood star status, you wouldn’t take her work here as anything but legit. Because it is. Now, as for the film, it’s not a very incisive look at life on the streets or at shelters for girls like Apple, which is where the action eventually leads us. But if the story is truly about those communal homes that give pregnant teens a comfortable place to find stability, Gimme Shelter waits way too long to spring it on us. This is a good outcome for Hudgens, but that’s about it.