Thoughts on Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret.

    On Hulu, I watched the 2023 coming-of-age dramedy Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret., written and directed by Kelly Fremon Craig (The Edge of Seventeen), based on the 1970 novel of the same name by Judy Blume. The film is set in 1970 and focuses on 11-year old Margaret Simon (Abby Ryder Fortson), who lives in New York City with her mom Barbara (Rachel McAdams) and Herb (Benny Safdie). Her parents tell her that they are moving from NYC to a New Jersey suburb, and Margaret is upset about leaving her friends and her life behind, and most importantly, her grandmother Sylvia (Kathy Bates). The family moves to the suburbs, and Margaret is immediately befriended by her neighbor and soon-to-be classmate Nancy Wheeler (Elle Graham), who shows up at the Simon's house already knowing the basic stats on Margaret and being like, "You're with me now." She invites her into her friend group with Gretchen Potter (Katherine Kupferer) and Janie Loomis (Amari Alexis Price). Nancy organizes the group to have a secret club where, according to Nancy, none of them can wear socks (leaving Margaret with blisters on her first day of school), they all have to wear a bra (in which three of them get a Gro-Bra training bra), and they have to keep a "Boy Book" of their school crushes, mainly admiring the same boy, Philip Leroy (Zackary Brooks). And the famous "we must, we must, we must increase our bust" chant with the arm pumping looks ridiculously funny when acted out than when reading it on the page.

    Margaret adjusts to her new school and her friends, trying to fit in with Nancy, even though Nancy encourages bullying of Laura Danker (Isol Young), a taller girl who developed earlier than the other girls, making up slut-shaming rumors about her. Margaret though is struggling more with her religious identity, as her mother is Christian and her father is Jewish, and she wasn't raised with either religion, her parents wanting her to choose when she is an adult. Her class is assigned a year-long research assignment, and based on Margaret's answers in a class questionnaire, Mr. Benedict (Echo Kellum) encourages her to choose religion as her research project. Margaret goes to temple with her grandmother on an NYC visit, much to Sylvia's joy, and she goes to church with Janie and her family.

    Meanwhile, Barbara is trying to adjust to suburban life, joining various PTA committees, though her activities keeps her away from her true passions of painting and teaching art. Herb tries to mow the lawn, but cuts his finger, so a neighborhood boy, Moose (Aidan Wotjak-Hissong) cuts the lawn. The parents are happy together, and there is a cute flirtatious moment on the lawn when Herb pretends to rev up the mower seductively to tease Barbara.

    The film spans over the school year, as Margaret experiences the high and lows of her adolescence, like crushes and peer pressure, and anxiously awaiting growing breasts and getting her period, not wanting to feel left behind in her friend group, especially when other girls get their period ahead of her. There is more grappling with her religious identity, and not wanting to disappoint her parents or grandmother over which religion to pick, and feeling stressed out by her internal struggles.

    I really liked this movie a lot. I read the book when I was around 11, and while it's not my favorite of Judy Blume's books (that would be Starring Sally J. Freeman As Herself, based on Judy Blume's childhood in the 1940s), it's memorable for a funny childhood memory of mine as a 1990s kid. I hadn't had my period yet, and I was reading the book and read the 1970s description of a sanitary pad attached to a belt, which clips onto the underwear, as that was the feminine hygiene product at the time before adhesive pads were invented. I was upset and went downstairs to my mom and told her about that, and whined, "I'm gonna have to wear a belt?!" My mom laughed and said, "It's not like that anymore." Later printings of the book did change that part to an adhesive pad, and the movie depicts it as an adhesive pad as well, even though that would have been anachronistic with the period setting of the movie.

    Abby Lee Fortson was wonderful as Margaret. She brought a lot of realism and sensitivity in her portrayal, making Margaret not perfect, a little messy (especially when she snaps at Laura Danker and goes along with Nancy's bullying, then immediately regrets it when Laura calls her out on her meanness), and overall a normal kid. Fortson had played Paul Rudd and Judy Greer's daughter in the first two Ant-Man movies, and was just cast as Velma in the latest Scooby-Doo project, so it'll be good to see how her career progresses.

    Elle Graham had a harder role to play with Nancy, of making her a Type-A leader with a controlling personality, who bullies another girl over being too tall and having boobs, yet isn't a monster or a horrible person, and it's a fine line to balance, and Graham is great in making Nancy feel like a normal kid as well. She is immature while is a natural leader, encourages her friends to talk about their periods and their crushes and their breasts, and is still a kid, like when she gets her period for the first time while out at a restaurant with her family and Margaret, and is embarrassed and is calling for her mom to help her. She really shines in this film with a more complex role to play.

    Rachel McAdams is great as always, playing a woman who is watching her daughter grow into puberty, not wanting her to grow up too fast. When they go bra shopping (and Barbara is hesitant, like "Do you think you really need one?") and Margaret tries on a bra and is like "I immediately want to take it off," Barbara goes, "Welcome to womanhood." Her parents disowned her because she married a Jewish man, and she and Herb wanted Margaret to make her own decisions about religion and not have it define her life or choices. 

    When Barbara is trying to fit in with the local moms, she is eager to join, but finds it tedious, like cutting out lots of cloth stars for a school dance to fill up the ceiling, or having to put on a fake smile for things she doesn't want to do. It is a relief for her that, at the end of the school year, when time comes to re-enroll in committee activities, she at first looks for an excuse before happily going, "I don't want to do it!" and driving off.

    I liked how the music had early 1970s songs without them being the obvious hits, or that the characters seemed more contemporary and not hitting the audience over the head with "This is the 70s!" in a cartoonish way. It's like when I watched The Wonder Years as a kid and didn't notice that the show was set in the 1960s and 1970s, because I wasn't noticing the costumes or period details, paying closer attention to the stories and characters, and that the themes about family and school and friends were still relatable today. Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret. had the same feeling, of a story about girlhood being the same regardless of the period details, and I really thought it was a wonderful film.

Thoughts on Get Low

    Last Sunday on Tubi, I watched Get Low, a 2009 drama directed by Aaron Schneider and co-written by Chris Provenzano, C. Gaby Mitchell, and Scott Seeke. The story is loosely based on a true story about Felix Bushaloo "Uncle Bush" Breazeale. The film stars Robert Duvall as Felix Bush, a man in 1930s Tennessee who has lived as a hermit in a cabin in the woods for 40 years, and the townspeople don't really know him, so they've spread rumors and stories about him for years, saying they've "heard" that he killed in cold blood, or that he's in league with the devil. One day, Felix comes into town in the local church, with a large roll of cash, and asks the preacher if he can have a funeral for himself, but while he's still alive, not after his death. The preacher refuses, finding it sacrilegious, but the local funeral home director Frank Quinn (Bill Murray) is facing financial troubles, and offers to arrange Felix's "living funeral." Felix wants to have the funeral to hear what everyone would say about him after he dies, and to hear what kind of stories they've been telling about him.

    As the funeral party is being planned, Frank's assistant Buddy (Lucas Black) is uncomfortable with the arrangements, feeling it isn't right, but goes along with Felix' wishes. He too finds Felix to be a mystery, and as others express skepticism over Felix' reasons for the party (one man [Scott Cooper] thinks that Felix wants to arrange everyone in one room for a mass shooting). Felix sweetens the deal, offering a $5 raffle with his property as the prize.

    Things get more complicated when an old story from Felix' past resurfaces, involving a local widow Mattie Darrow (Sissy Spacek), who was Felix' girlfriend 40 years prior in the 1890s, and her deceased sister, Mary Lee, who she accuses Felix of having been in love with and using Mattie to get to her. With a preacher friend Charlie Jackson (Bill Cobbs), Felix wants to use the funeral party not just to hear what others think of him, but also to tell the truth about something that happened decades prior, for which he feels immense guilt and built his cabin like a prison to sentence himself in all that time.

    It's a small film that feels personal and intimate, and like a folk tale that one would tell their children or grandchildren many years later, a story that would turn into a local legend. Robert Duvall was 79 at the time, and delivered one of his best performances late in his career, as this stubborn old man who secretly carries a lot of humanity in his heart. Bill Murray, Lucas Black, and Bill Cobbs were all good, but Sissy Spacek was fantastic, in a supporting role where she challenges Felix on his hardheadedness and makes him confront the past to get out of his self-exile. Spacek has always been such a naturalistic actor, with subtle performances in her senior years that can get taken for granted, and she was great in this film.

    I really liked Get Low. I had heard of it when it came out, and it got some critical acclaim, but didn't become a big mainstream hit. But with Duvall's recent passing at age 95, it's gotten some long overdue love, and I'm happy it's getting rediscovered nearly twenty years after its initial release.

Thoughts on Send Help

     Last week, I went to the Alamo Drafthouse in Lower Manhattan to see Send Help, a 2026 comedy thriller directed by Sam Raimi and co-written by Damian Shannon and Mark Swift. The film stars Rachel McAdams as Linda Liddle, a meek but hard-working office drone who has been awaiting a promotion to vice president at her corporate job. Unfortunately, the president died, leaving his arrogant son Bradley (Dylan O'Brien) in his place, and he is immediately disgusted by Linda's nerdy looks and the specks of her tuna fish sandwich on her face, and wants to make his frat buddy, who has only worked at the company six months, vice president. He plans to have Linda transferred out to a dead-end position at a satellite office in Bangkok to get rid of her.

    Linda lives at home alone with her cockatoo, has tons of books about wilderness survival, and films an audition video to be on the next season of Survivor. She stands up to Bradley at work, about him taking back her promotion, and he invites her on a business trip with him and his other slimeball bro executives to Bangkok to finalize a corporate merger. On the way there, a storm causes the engine to fail and the plane comes apart, crashing by a remote island in the Gulf of Thailand. Linda and Bradley are the only survivors, and with Linda's survival knowledge, she immediately knows to collect rainwater, build shelter, tend to Bradley's injured leg, and hunt for food. When Bradley is recovering, he reverts to treating her like a subordinate, despite that they are now stranded on an island and are no longer in an office environment. Linda tests Bradley's attitude by leaving him alone for two days, and when he nearly dies of thirst, she gives him water and takes control.

    The film focuses on a power struggle between Linda and Bradley, as Linda, thrilled at being the one in charge and with control, avoids any potential rescue by search teams because she doesn't want to go back to office life with Bradley back in his CEO position humiliating her. Bradley resents that he is now dependent on Linda, and will try to outsmart her, but keep failing at it because he doesn't have any real-world survival skills from growing up rich and privileged. 

    The movie is really funny, both due to McAdams' gleeful performance as a woman getting revenge on her boss, who just may be more twisted than he realizes, and O'Brien's performance as a smarmy jerk who is reduced to being a sniveling whiner when bested. The movie has blood and gore moments, like when Linda kills a wild boar, blood spraying in her face as she stabs it, or when she vomits after eating poisonous food, her yellow puke looking like creamed corn.

    I really enjoyed this movie, mostly for McAdams, and for liking the thriller and comedy combination, the homages to Cast Away, Misery, and Swept Away, and the silliness of it all.

Thoughts on Double Happiness

     On Criterion, I watched the 1994 Canadian drama Double Happiness, written and directed by Mina Shum. The film starred Sandra Oh in one of her earliest screen performances (and for which she won a Genie Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role) as Jade Li, a Chinese-Canadian woman who lives at home with her traditional Chinese family, and is struggling with wanting to be an actress and a creative artist, while also wanting to please her parents, who want her to marry a Chinese man and uphold their values. Her older brother Winston has been disowned and lives in the States, and she fears disappointing her parents and facing the same fate.

    She switches between speaking English and Cantonese with her family, and is close with her younger sister Pearl (Frances You). Her family is concerned with putting on a good public persona to their friends, like when her father's (Stephen Chang) childhood friend Ah Hong (Donald Fong) comes to visit and the mother (Alannah Ong) makes her daughters wish him luck and a happy new year in rehearsed Cantonese unison. Jade's family sets her up on dates with the Chinese sons of their friends, including one, Andrew (Johnny Mah), who is secretly gay and just goes along with the dates once a year to appease his mother. For the dates, her family makes her dress up in pearls and an overly coiffed hairdo, to which her mom approvingly tells her that she looks like Connie Chung.

    The "double happiness" of the title is from Jade trying to live both her paths in life, as an aspiring actress and hanging out with her friend Lisa (Claudette Carracedo), and being in deference to her parents, who scold her for any mistake she makes and treat her like a child despite that she is a grown woman in her twenties. She wants to move out, but is afraid to confront her parents about it, not wanting to be cast out like Winston was.

    Through a chance meeting and brief hookup, she meets Mark (Callum Keith Rennie), a shy but cute nerd who had awkwardly flirted with her outside of a nightclub they were both denied entry to, and while Jade is hesitant to date him because he is white and her parents wouldn't approve, she still feels drawn to him, and they see each other casually, with her feeling torn between her desires for him and her duties towards her family. Their chemistry is really sweet and adorable, and their romance was one of my favorite parts of the movie.

    There's a lot of talk about a conflicting pressure to assimilate while still upholding her family's culture, like being expected to be fluent in English and Cantonese at the same time, and being held to Asian stereotypes when auditioning, or being told by an Asian woman that she's not really Chinese if she can't read Chinese in a script.

    I really liked this film a lot. I liked how it felt relatable to me in feeling family obligations, and wanting to be free to do things while not wanting to feel controlled by parental influence and being shamed for it. Sandra Oh was excellent in this film, and I especially liked the sequences when she is in her room practicing monologues and going into abstract worlds, with the colors and costumes changing, before one of her family members would be calling for her from downstairs and interrupting her inner world, it had a very dreamlike feel to it.

    There's an excellent sequence where Jade is escaping one of her dates (whose face is never shown, he's meant to be representative of the generic Chinese white collar men she is set up with by her parents) by running down the street, throwing off her coat and mussing up her Connie Chung hairdo, crying and literally breaking free while Sonic Youth's "Sugar Kane" plays, it's very emotional and thrilling to watch.

    The film will also have confessional sequences, done documentary film style, where the characters will talk to an unknown person, and there's a great scene where Alannah Ong as Jade's mother talks about being a child and joining in on the bullying of a mute woman, calling her "Dumb Dumb," then only after being a mother herself learning about the trauma that was inflicted on that woman that caused her to never speak again, and feeling shame for her ignorance and cruelty towards her.

    Some of the film score is by the Toronto-based band Shadowy Men on a Shadowy Planet, who are best known for doing the theme song to the TV show The Kids in the Hall.

    I really liked how the film is more about holding onto a sense of self and not giving up one's identity just to satisfy family expectations, as it can feel good in the short-term to appease what parents want but isn't good for someone's long-term mental health. The film is dated as a 1990s Canadian independent film, but still holds up a lot with its messages about family and identity and being a first generation child of immigrant parents.

Thoughts on Laggies

    I rewatched Laggies today, a 2014 film directed by Lynn Shelton and written by Andrea Seigel, and I liked it, but I couldn't suspend my disbelief that Sam Rockwell's dad character Craig would really let this random near-30 year old woman named Megan (Keira Knightley) stay in his house because she is friends with his teen daughter Annika (Chloë Grace Moretz) (which already came off as weird and questionable), buying her cover story of "waiting to move into her new apartment," and just being dumb enough to give her a pass because she's attractive. It felt really implausible to me, especially since Craig comes off more as a sarcastic cynic type, and is a lawyer, and should have seen the red flags come up more.

    Megan had been with her boyfriend Anthony (Mark Webber) since high school, she's had the same friend group since then, and they're all 28 and Megan is going through a quarter life crisis, not having a real career and being stagnant in her life, so when Anthony proposes to her, she freaks and makes an excuse to go to a seminar for a week on nearby Orcas Island, and really by chance befriends Annika and her friends (including a pre-fame Kaitlyn Dever), uses the apartment excuse to lay low at her and Craig's house, and is operating under false pretenses while getting involved in their lives.

    I like the movie, mostly the lead performances, but the stretches that people will believe Megan's lies makes the story less believable to me.

    A funny aside: when I watched the movie years ago with the commentary on by the late director Lynn Shelton, she comments on a sexy moment where Sam Rockwell drops his umbrella and pulls Keira Knightley by her coat into a kiss, and Lynn goes, "And that's why Sam Rockwell gets paid the big bucks." Lynn Shelton passed away way too soon, she was a great talent in the indie film world.

Thoughts on Bright Star

   I had heard of Bright Star way back in 2009, Jane Campion's romantic period drama about the brief love affair between John Keats (Ben Whishaw) and Fanny Brawne (Abbie Cornish). It was so quiet and full of longing, set in 1818 Hampstead, England, where John Keats is a shy, quiet poet who is a penniless instructor, and Fanny Brawne is a outspoken flirt interested in fashion who comes from a middle class family, and they share a double house, living on different sides of it, and eventually fall in love, but can't be together because of his meager circumstances. As her mother says, of his reluctance to initially pursue her, "Mr. Keats knows he cannot like you, he has no living and no income." She pines for him when he goes to London to try to get work, waiting for his letters and is melodramatic in the period between receiving responses from him, acting like she will die of despair. When he returns, her mother is worried that she is growing too attached to him, wanting her to be available for more eligible suitors.

    I really liked a scene where they communicate with each other by rapping on the walls opposite their rooms, trying to listen to each other, it was really sexy in a hidden desires kind of way.

    I liked how it was a quiet courtship, how they kiss so softly with a lot of restrained emotion, and how delicate yet powerful Ben Whishaw's performance as Keats was. I liked Abbie Cornish's performance, how it was a little more broad because Fanny can afford to be more dramatic than John can, but still had a lovely soul to her characterization. I liked how they bonded over poetry, and how the film honored Keats' poetry and legacy while describing the beauty and intimacy of his relationship with Fanny.

Thoughts on Scarlet

    Scarlet (2025) was a gender-bent fantasy version of Hamlet, where the princess Scarlet, in late 16th century Denmark, tries to avenge the death of her father (the king killed by his brother to usurp the throne), only to be killed by her uncle and end up in the Land of the Dead, where people roam deserts and can still be killed in the afterlife, being turned into dust and nothingness. She still wants to avenge her father's death and kill her uncle, who is now in the afterlife along with his men and all the people of her kingdom, as centuries has passed, and she is joined by a contemporary paramedic who is in denial that he died, and she only has revenge on her mind and killing minions while he wants to heal people and not kill anyone.

    I really liked the animation, as there were some stunning shots, though the switch between 2D and 3D animation was a little jarring, it reminded me of watching Titan A.E. and the rocky switch with 2000s-era CGI mixed with 2D animation, and this movie came out last year.
I wasn't into the forced love interest with the guy, as I found him pretty dull, and she had been dead for centuries and still obsessed with killing her uncle, which made the afterlife seem more miserable if people could still die a second time there or be forced to just roam aimlessly.

    At one point, the guy plays a lute and is like, "Here's a song from the far future," and I started giggling in the theater, because I half-expected it to turn into a "anyway, here's 'Wonderwall'" meme or for him to play "Baby Got Back."

    The story was mostly about how she was letting vengeance consume her and that she had wasted her life plotting to kill her uncle with her fight training, only to die and still be obsessed with wanting revenge, and her having to learn how to let go.

    This was directed by Mamoru Hosoda, who also directed Belle in 2021, an anime film I had really liked that is more contemporary, where the main character is a teen girl who has a popular Internet avatar as an alter ego.

    I liked the movie, I don't hate it like the other reviews on Letterboxd do, but I just think it was really pretty and gorgeous to look at with an interesting fantasy version of Hamlet, but could have had better story and character development.