Lady Bird - Review
This review of Lady Bird has mild spoilers!
Growing up is a funny and fickle thing. Everyone does it, but nobody realizes the impact it has on them until it's over. The time in our life where we believe in being rebellious and that your parents are always in the wrong and you're always right. What Lady Bird does so right is take this time in our lives, and the usual coming of age genre of films, and creates something beautifully relatable. That's thanks to both the star in Saoirse Ronan and Greta Gerwig's directing. Their work together is some of the best I've seen this year, and while Lady Bird isn't the longest film to come this year, it's one of the most powerful and touching.
In a story of this nature, it lives or dies on its star. As I've mentioned previously, "Lady Bird" (portrayed by Saoirse Ronan), is a rebellious teenager in her senior year of high school in Sacramento, California. She's relatable and easily someone the audience can sympathize with. She's a girl whose trying to find her place in the world and do her own thing. That's what I mean when I say Ronan makes her so easy to sympathize with, we all were that person in the crowd who felt out of place or just like they didn't belong. Watching her struggle with strife, and thrive in joy throughout her final days in high school was both joyous and sad. Likening back to moments from my own high school days I found myself shedding tears watching her realize the time is flying by. Simply masterful work done here by Saoirse.
Circling back, it's important to discuss in the vaguest of terms what actually happens in this film. Lady Bird herself starts out the movie having a car argument with her mother. Instantly connecting with the audience you are interested in her story and seeing her rebellious nature. Her family simply wants whats best for her, but she's only thinking of how she can help herself and not the darker truths around her. She wants to go to the East Coast for college, but doesn't want to upset her mother. She enlists the only other person in the world who can help her in her father, who has recently been laid off. This internal strife among the family members come to a head later on in the film and helps to create the powerful climax and finale that had me in tears. Another moment of recognition and connection with the audience is seeing Lady Bird's friends change as she's trying to fit into her new world. It's these moments like I continue to say that really make it such a beautiful mirror of so many people's lives.
I mentioned at the very beginning of this piece the brilliant job Greta Gerwig does directing this film. How great that is actually pales in comparison to how well written and the film is. Again she is able to tap into the heartbeat of the viewer, seemingly pulling the words directly from their minds. This ability to connect with the audience is something that not many films can do and she does it with ease. The final few moments of this film take a turn from the rest of the story, and are all about Lady Bird's new life. She is reflecting on the past and what has happened. Seeing the film go by in her mind, whether it is shown on screen or just thought in her head; it was beautiful. Greta Gerwig in my mind deserves Oscar consideration for her directing and writing.
Lady Bird is a rare breed of film. Made for Oscar consideration and to hit the nerve of those who do the deciding on those types of films, but it does something else. It can connect with it's viewers better than any Oscar film usually can. Coming of age stories rarely are this well done, and the story of Lady Bird herself manages to be a well done and excellently directed piece of cinema. When I left the theater and had time to sit on the film, I instantly knew that what I had just seen was something special. If you have the chance this winter season to see any movie, make Lady Bird a priority.
