Booksmart and Eighth Grade are now available to rent, stream or buy.
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BOOKSMART (2019)
If one director has come the closest to creating a modern-day John Hughes vibe, it’s Olivia Wilde. Her feature directorial debut, Booksmart, is built upon the energy of an electrical transformer detonating in our hands as we follow Beanie Feldstein’s Molly and Kaitlyn Dever’s Amy. Just as in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off or Pretty in Pink, Molly and Amy’s relationship shines with a ferocity and complexity akin to Ferris and Cameron or Andie and Duckie; in fact, Feldstein and Dever complement each other so perfectly that one could watch them for hours without ever becoming bored.
However, like Hughes’ best films, Booksmart’s brilliance is also held in a superb ensemble cast: Lisa Kudrow, Will Forte, Jason Sudeikis, Billie Lourd, Skyler Gisondo and Molly Gordon, to name but a few. Each cast member has room to breathe in Halpen, Haskins and Fogel’s delightful screenplay. In this troupe of fantastic talent, Billie Lourd particularly stands out for me despite her limited screen time; after all, everyone has known a Gigi in the past, right? You know, the kid alienated by others for being too weird when they’re really the coolest person in school.
Part of Booksmart’s enduring brilliance is its breakneck pace – kinetic camerawork, surprisingly chaotic set pieces, and non-stop hilarity and hijinks. Booksmart only stops to take a breather at key points, just like the young people at its heart. But it is within the breath of fresh air it brings to the classic coming-of-age love story that Booksmart finds its voice. Here, the love story at its heart is one of two friends who are more like sisters, with Amy’s queerness placed front and centre. The story never falls victim to the typical coming-of-age clichés but writhes with themes of difference, gender equality, sexuality, belonging, escape and sisterly love.
Resisting a range of coming-of-age stereotypes, Booksmart is wrapped in a modern reflection of youth subculture, as Amy and Molly free themselves from the academic ties that constrain them. Booksmart reflects an eternal truth of school life: the classroom and corridors are a hive of segregation based on preconceived and rarely challenged stereotypes; after all, how many of us missed out on amazing friendships and memories because our prejudices and assumptions got in the way?
John Hughes was a master of subculture exploration both within and outside school. But Booksmart continues this discussion with a thoroughly modern eye for detail. It challenges the school system’s ever-changing yet eternal social fabric by asking us to communicate and embrace difference, challenging a range of perceptions and stereotypes that ultimately mean less as we enter adult life.
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EIGHTH GRADE (2018)
Eighth Grade is unique; it captures a universal perspective on an immensely subjective experience. If you had said before 2018 that a male comedian in his late twenties would perfectly capture the feelings of a female middle-schooler in the online age, many, including me, would have scoffed. Yet, that is precisely what Bo Burnham achieved with his stunning directorial debut.
This treasure was crafted through Burnham’s comedy routine over many years as he grappled with themes of sexuality, the sense of self, mental illness amidst an online audience, and anxiety. Maybe for that reason, Eighth Grade is one of the most anxiety-inducing films I have ever watched, a trait typically reserved for terrifying horror or heart-pumping thrillers. Of course, for some, Eighth Grade is a horror as it puts the terror of mingling as a teen on full display, with a grossly honest depiction of how truly awkward adolescence is.
In interviews, Burnham commented on the importance of the eighth grade (Year 9 in the UK) as a crucial year for forming self-awareness, and perhaps that’s what makes the film strangely terrifying. Here, we walk alongside Kayla as she struggles with social connections, yearns to return to childhood and desperately seeks adult experiences. It is as if Burnham somehow bottled the modern essence of being thirteen before releasing it on an unsuspecting audience. The way that Kayla, Olivia, and Gabe interact is authentic, as are the anxieties and uncertainties with an internet-age bow.
However, for all of Burnham’s mastery, newcomer Elsie Fisher was the real star. Bo decided on Elsie because “she was the only one who felt like a shy kid pretending to be confident – everyone else felt like a confident kid pretending to be shy.” That statement alone reflects the experience of so many of us. I don’t believe we ever stop pretending to be confident – fake it till you make it, right? This is why Eighth Grade is such a heart-pounding experience. It feels like you’ve been dropped into a nightmare from secondary school, and you’re perpetually in fight-or-flight mode. You desperately want to reach out and tell Kayla, “This will pass,” just as you wished someone had told you the same.
One of Eighth Grade’s most fascinating assets to this day is Anna Meredith’s soundtrack, where scenes pulsate with electronic melodies and technological sonnets. In Meredith’s musical world, each sound underscores the emotions that Kayla emits throughout the film to her online audience and friends. But when she finally speaks with her dad, it’s silent, her fire-side chat with Mark (Josh Hamilton), the film’s beating heart.
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