"The Princess Diaries" earned mixed reviews from film critics upon release. Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reports that 48% of 115 critics surveyed reviewed the film positively. The website's critical consensus reads, "A charming, if familiar, makeover movie for young teenage girls." Metacritic assigned the film a weighted score of 52 based on 27 reviews, indicating "Mixed or average reviews". Ed Park, writing for "The Village Voice", reviewed the film as "a modest, enjoyable fairy tale that easily outcharms its animated stablemates of the past decade", continuing, "The movie hits its timeworn marks with grace and wit, thanks to game gamine Hathaway and an effortlessly regal Andrews." Calling "The Princess Diaries" "an ideal family film", Kevin Thomas of the "Los Angeles Times" commended Marshall's ability to "mak make-believe seem real" while describing Wendkos' screenplay as "skillfully adapted" and praising Andrews' performance. Awarding the film a B+, "Entertainment Weekly" film critic Lisa Schwarzbaum wrote that Marshall "directs Gina Wendkos' girl-wise script ... with avuncular affection and, by his standards, a minimum of court jestering, and he encourages moments of appropriate delirium among his large cast", highlighting Andrews and Oh's contributions and dubbing it a "charming ... production" that "gets the duckling-to-swan ambivalence just right".