Let us anticipate Greta Gerwig's directorial debut "Lady Bird"

yeah I don't really know why it was Rated R. We took my 11 1/2 year old because my wife didn't want to leave him home alone and we didn't want to pay for a sitter. It was fine, he already knows about sex and just kind of hid his face in the one half-graphic scene, which really wans't any more graphic that what you see on network TV these days.

I loved this film. I grew up in Sacramento, to a point (moved when I was 8 1/2 in 1981, so quite a bit earlier) and retain some kind of nostalgia for it which this movie kind of vindicated, though it's a pretty glorified image of it, the city is certainly shit in lots of ways. I loved that they were excited for the State Fair and the log ride which was also my favorite thing when I was a kid.

this is one of the better coming of age movies I've ever seen; she very realistically straddles that stubborn awful teenage willfullness with something more mature; and I like that in the end, personally, I believe she's right; she did need to move out of Sacramento.

saw it cold, loved it, recommend it.

liked it also, yes v good re coming of age

lady bird as a character reminded some of anna pacquins character in margaret

gotta say too that the save a horse ride a cowboy tshirts @ that western party (?) made me immed think of ilx/ilm

ha me too, although I remember Big & Rich as a late '03 phenomenon.

It just hit trope after trope: gay boyfriend in theatre; prettier girl ignores the kind fat best friend until a lesson is learned.

And then the worst one: NYC as savior (mixed in with some remembrance for the old country).

As my friend said while the credits rolled: ‘doesn’t the next one start just about now?’

Sarosie Ronan is unbelievable, but I don’t get the praise

Do you not like tropes

And then the worst one: NYC as savior

huh. did you watch this movie

yeah it was super tropey but sorta in the way of like, hey, if you're gonna do a tropey high school movie, I'm throwing down the gauntlet: do it at LEAST this well, or don't bother. the script was so good and sharp and funny and well-observed even when the situations were seen-it-a-million-times. the fury road of senior-year movies.

new york is not pitched as a savior tho - she has the same baggage there, is encountering the same dumbass dudes, and is making some of the same mistakes even. SHE goes there thinking it's the marvelous land of oz and it genuinely means a lot to her to be leaving home, but the movie gives us plenty of space to not buy into that... indeed to realize she'll grow up to be someone who can look back on this as a fairly dopey wide-eyed move that put a lot of pressure on her parents' finances and that sacramento isn't all bad (etc etc). but that it all turns out right in the end.

only thing that bugs me is the handling of her name in the very last scene. might have come off differently to me ten or five years ago, but in 2017 it felt weirdly situated re: trans identity and now it feels like a movie i should not recommend to friends blindly.

Well, Lady Bird isn't exactly sympathetic to her closeted boyfriend's situation until the moment he collapses in her arms. So woke she ain't.

No one was. Period piece.

it was tropey but it did things that pretty in pink brought up, and did them right (it's no accident that both the dresses she picks are pink). for instance: the probably gay friend turns out to be actually gay here. And, she sides with some real friends in the end, rather than going with the douche.

"only thing that bugs me is the handling of her name in the very last scene. might have come off differently to me ten or five years ago, but in 2017 it felt weirdly situated re: trans identity and now it feels like a movie i should not recommend to friends blindly." Huh, I'm not reading you.

we're supposed to find it touching and powerful that she sheds her chosen name for the "good name" her parents gave her. feel like for a lot of people, that will be a super unpleasant moment that throws them out of the movie.

it may but hopefully they can see outside their own selves enough that its real & works for this character, perspective of distance from her parents illuminating how they did the best they could &c &c

maybe? i dunno? just saying that it makes me feel like i'd be being a dick to tell all my friends oh man you will LOVE this movie, it gets everything right!

I've never felt that way.

Likewise.

I love many movies that get many things wrong.

re: "wrong," maybe playing with fire here, but if the ending of this movie is enough to give you pause, what entertainments out there do you regard as safe?

jeez y'all. i'm just saying that the trans/NB people in my life are very sensitive to narratives about given vs chosen names and it just played really weird, to me, to have it be played as a happy-ending payoff that a character who's earlier articulated a pretty groovy claim on her name ("I gave it to myself") later is like oh nah forget it. and it's fine for her to be oh nah forget it! but we're supposed to feel big feelings that she does, and *that* felt weird to me.

but tbf it's early and I'm still working on my coffee so I might not be doing the best job expressing this

And I might be doing my best job resisting it.

gotta say too that the save a horse ride a cowboy tshirts @ that western party (?) made me immed think of ilx/ilm

― johnny crunch, Tuesday, November 21, 2017 7:58 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

ha me too, although I remember Big & Rich as a late '03 phenomenon.

― morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, November 21, 2017 8:02 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

lol yes i figured it was an anachronism (the single and the album it was on both came out in spring 2004)--but then wondered whether "save a horse, ride a cowboy" was just a phrase that people said before big & rich made a song out of it?

pretty sure it was? but when i try to remember i just hear the song in my head.

i was pretty surprised they were allowed to wear shirts that said that to a dance at a catholic school

as a nonbinary person who has often considered changing their name, doc casino’s point honestly never occurred to me as i was watching it. huh

huh, fair enough - I'll def trust your perspective on this more than my second-guessing of my own!

i mean i actually find what you’re saying really interesting, even as my experience of the film was more along the lines of what johnny crunch said

Loved it. Loved how so many minor characters (the two play directors) could be drawn so sharply in a scene or two.

It's like the Veep style turned into something other than mean comedy, as far as efficiency and detail.

^^ Left-field comparison, I know, but this thing moved without being farce.

oh yeah lmao the football coach subbing for the theater director was hilarious

football coach was hilarious if a cartoon. but a good cartoon of how a precocious high schooler sees a coach. like something from daria. i hope high schoolers are seeing this movie! i hope it replaces those john hughes movies or whatever else are considered standards of the genre.

but the first director was incredible. i never did theater so maybe those are all stock scenes that every high school theater kid would know but i thought they were really beautifully done. loved how all the teachers in this, even coach, felt like they really liked kids and wanted to see them happy/successful, even if they have their flaws and limits. they weren't as fleshed out as the other adults, sure, and a high schooler watching will probably see them overwhelmingly in terms of what they mean to the leads (e.g. math teacher crush guy is sth we can all relate to via julia: oh nooooo he has a wife and she's pregnant even!). but the actor plays it like he's playing a real person so if the same kid watches it a few years later maybe there's something else they can appreciate there.

Was there any explanation as to what the first director was going through--why he was seeing Laurie Metcalf? I assumed it was general depression, but maybe I missed something.

Son died, maybe suicide?

That scene was so amazing in rounding out Laurie Metcalf's character, too -- seeing her on the job as a true caretaker.

yeah, i loved that. it seemed like all the other people in town had a very different perception of lady bird's mom--they got to see a warm, caring, and even funny side of her that she wouldn't allow lady bird to see, just shown in short scenes with the father and with her co-workers

the theatre nerd in me loved that they did Merrily, We Roll Along...and committed to showing it!

Between Sondheim and "Crash" and "You Oughta Know" and "Cry Me A River," the music rights must've been a big line item.

And "Tha Crossroads!" A great, great, pick - years out of date but weirdly plausible to me as a slow-dance song at a religious school in 2002.

lol yeah, it's got a nice religious message and it would pass the nuns' rigid censorship

https://pixel.nymag.com/imgs/daily/vulture/2017/11/21/greta/21-greta-gerwig-letter-music-2.nocrop.w710.h2147483647.jpg

That's sweet. I wrote a letter just like that to the Angry Samoans when I was making student films.

seein it tonight

My review.

V sweetly written up Alfred :)

yes. this is great and v on-point with how i remember the later stretches of high school: "both outcasts who use wit not so much as a rapier against the popular kids at their Catholic high school but as an end in itself because rapiers are cool."

i remember the uncle conversation differently though - doesn't lady bird just say "he's not your uncle," and julie responds, "it's something I'm trying out"? as in, she's trying out calling him that?

thanks!

@ Doc Casino: I saw at least one trans writer on Twitter pick up on the same thing you mentioned w/r/t the ending

beautiful review, Alfred

i found this perfectly cozy and lovely world to inhabit for a couple hours. can't wait for her next flick, but also, i hope she keeps acting or casts herself

Just saw it a second time; being prepared for the jokes made me be present enough to notice how sad I felt about many of the laugh lines