Lady Bird (2017)

One of the hardest things for any film to do is to be human. True humanity is extremely hard to capture in the pre-planned conversations of a script or in the often-visionary lens of a director’s camera. Even going to such lengths as filming the same cast over twelve years (looking at you, Boyhood) does not guarantee that a movie can be a true slice of life.

Somehow, some way, Greta Gerwig, in her first film in the director’s chair no less, has made one of the most genuinely human films I have ever seen. Lady Bird is an organic piece of cinematic art that doesn’t try to be terribly artistically original or innovative; it simply tells a human coming-of-age story, and it does it better than nearly any other film I have seen.

As much as I’d love to claim that there is no one aspect of the film that helps this, ultimately the film rests on the shoulders of its cast. Without the amazing performances from Saoirse Ronan, Laurie Metcalf, Lucas Hedges, and everyone else involved, the human reactions in the screenplay would not have nearly the authenticity they do. Ronan in particular shines once again, and at this point in the year I can confidently predict her contention for an Oscar nomination: she perfectly embodies the spunk and complexity of Lady Bird’s personality while playing everything subtly enough to retain human believability. Metcalf plays off Ronan well, and the chemistry between the two is perfect for their tense mother-daughter relationship. It’s easy to see how both characters change throughout the film because of their performances.

The organic nature of Lady Bird is not something I know how to adequately explain in the rest of the film, simply because I’ve never seen anything like it before. Scenes don’t feel like they have an agenda to progress the plot; they simply capture snapshots of what is happening in the characters’ lives. Every moment in the film is a moment of character development, offering some deep looks into every character’s psyche. To top it off, Lady Bird is hilarious in exactly the right way, not working outside of the characterizations it presents but offering up wry, real-world humor. All this gives the film a unique, natural feel that I can’t say I’ve had in any film before, and for that reason this is easily one of the best films I have seen this year.

My recommendation: Definitely see this. It’s a masterpiece of character work.

My grade: 97/100