Lady Bird

Dir: Greta Gerwig

2017

*****

I adore Greta Gerwig’s films. I think Frances Ha is my favorite so far – everything about it is perfect. So I was slightly thrilled when I learned that after Noah Baumbach (her boyfriend and director of Frances Ha) offered to direct her new film, she declined, after releasing it was something she had to do herself. She described the film as semi-autobiographical, although "nothing in the movie literally happened in my life, but it has a core of truth that resonates with what I know". Lady Bird is set in 2002 – before smart phones (Gerwig actually banned them from set) – and at a time when Gerwig herself was finishing high-school. To prepare the cast and crew, Gerwig gave them her old high-school yearbooks, photos, and journals, as well as passages written by Joan Didion, and took them on a tour of her hometown, as Lady Bird is about Sacramento as much as it is about the characters. Indeed, the film begins with a Didion quote: “Anybody who talks about California hedonism has never spent a Christmas in Sacramento.” – Didion being a fellow Sacramento resident and an inspiration to Gerwig. Gerwig said to her director of photography Sam Levy that she wanted the film to feel "like a memory," and said that she "sought to offer a female counterpart to tales like The 400 Blows and Boyhood." I believe she has done just that. I can think of many a film about prepubescent girls, high-school girls and college girls but I can’t think of any that represent real girls as well as Lady Bird does. Christine "Lady Bird" McPherson (played brilliantly by Saoirse Ronan) is naive but not stupid, rude but never nasty and as wonderful as she is flawed. She’s the quintessential seventeen year old that you never see in Hollywood movies. She’s also not the funky off the wall individualist you might expect from a little indie film either – I know Lady Bird, I went to school with her. Saoirse Ronan and Greta Gerwig first met each other at the Toronto Film Festival in 2015 when Ronan was promoting Brooklyn and Gerwig was promoting Maggie's Plan. Ronan had already read Gerwig's script and instantly connected with the titular character, so when both women discussed the script at length in Ronan's hotel room, Ronan started reading it out aloud and Gerwig knew that she had found her "Lady Bird” by page two. Ronan clearly understood the part. She had done some stage work prior to filming the movie, and the heavy make-up combined with hot stage lights had caused some spontaneous eruptions of acne. Rather than covering it up, Ronan convinced director Greta Gerwig to leave it visible, to differentiate the movie from most other coming-of-age dramas full of teenagers with perfect skin. Gerwig concurred immediately, another example of why this is a great film, made from one vision and one great lead performance. That said, a great performance always needs support and Laurie Metcalf is, once again, astonishingly good. The chemistry between the two is brilliant. The story begins with us seeing Christine "Lady Bird" McPherson as a senior student at a Catholic high school in Sacramento in 2002. She longs to attend a prestigious college in "a city with culture". Her family is struggling financially, and her mother tells her that Lady Bird is ungrateful for what she has. They both argue, although the opening scene is a tender one between the two of them. Lady Bird and her best friend Julie join their school theater program, where Lady Bird meets Danny O'Neill. She and Danny develop a romantic relationship, and she has Thanksgiving dinner with Danny's wealthy family instead of her own, disappointing her mother. Their relationship ends when Lady Bird discovers Danny kissing a boy in a toilet after their debut performance. At the behest of her mother, Lady Bird takes a job at a coffee shop, where she meets Kyle, a young musician she recognizes from a gig the previous semester. They get talking and begin dating. One of the popular girls at the school, Jenna, is reprimanded by a nun for wearing a short skirt, and Lady Bird suggests that she and Jenna bond by vandalizing the nun's car – even though Lady Bird really likes and respects said Nun. As Lady Bird grows closer to Kyle and Jenna, she gradually deserts Julie. Lady Bird drops out of the theater program. At the coffee shop, she consoles Danny after he expresses his struggle in coming out, and they become friends again. After Kyle tells Lady Bird he is a virgin, she loses her virginity to him, but he later denies having said it and confesses he’s lost track of how many girls he’s been with. This leaves her unfulfilled, and contributes to their breakup. The best part of this scenario is its honesty. Kyle might not be a virgin but he lasts seconds in bed. He is clearly all talk and far more in love with himself then anyone else. Things fall apart somewhat when Jenna unintentionally visits Danny's grandmother's house, which, to appear wealthy, Lady Bird had claimed was her own. Lady Bird admits to the lie; Jenna agrees to forgive her because of their mutual friendship with Kyle but makes it clear that they are no longer friends. Lady Bird then discovers that her father has lost his job and has been battling depression for years – but this doesn’t stop her from asking him to pay should she be accepted to the expensive college of her dreams. Lady Bird begins applying to East Coast colleges despite her mother's insistence that the family cannot afford it. She is accepted into UC Davis but is upset because she feels it is too close to home. She subsequently learns that she has been placed on the wait list for a New York college but does not share the news with her mother, fearing her response. Lady Bird sets out for her high school prom with Kyle, Jenna, and Jenna’s boyfriend, but the four decide to go to a house party instead. Lady Bird changes her mind during the car ride and asks them to drop her off at Julie's apartment, where the two rekindle their friendship and go to prom together. The story then lifts as it becomes more and more familiar. When her mother finds out that she has been wait-listed, she stops talking to her for the rest of the summer. When Lady Bird learns she has been accepted by the New York college, and can afford the tuition with financial aid and her father's help, her parents take her to the airport, but her mother refuses to go inside to say goodbye. She has a change of heart and drives back, only to discover Lady Bird had already crossed security. It is never made clear whether Lady Bird learns of this or not but her father sends her several started but abandoned letters her mother has written her that declare how much she means to her. During her first night at collage she makes a move on a boy who clearly isn’t her type and gets so drunk that she is hospitalized. A whole new chapter of learning and making mistakes is upon her. It’s a story that I think many people can relate to. It is a relief to see such a film about a young women that doesn’t feature sororities, outlandish prom nights, bitching and all the usual brattish stuff that 1995’s Clueless instigated. My favorite scene is where, on her 18th birthday, Lady Bird celebrates by going to the local shop and buys a pack of cigarettes, a scratch-off lotto ticket and an issue of Playgirl magazine. Lady Bird is clumsy, selfish and naive but is intelligent, has a good sense of humour and is clearly developing into a good adult. There is nothing to dislike about the film, it’s near perfect.