Directed by: Marielle Heller.
Written by: Marielle Heller based on the novel by Phoebe Gloeckner.
Starring: Bel Powley (Minnie), Kristen Wiig (Charlotte), Alexander Skarsgård (Monroe), Christopher Meloni (Pascal), Miranda Bailey (Andrea), Abby Wait (Gretel), Austin Lyon (Ricky Wasserman), Margarita Levieva (Tabatha).
The
Diary of a Teenage Girl is a film about 15-year old Minnie (an extraordinary
Bel Powley) discovering her sexuality, and exploring it without shame. She
likes sex, and ends up making what most people would consider mistakes in
choosing her partners – all of whom exploit her in one way or another, even if
she doesn’t quite see it like that. The movie actually does show her cut off a
couple different sexual relationships when they start veering towards territory
she doesn’t like, or feel comfortable with – and admitting that she has made
some mistakes, but still she refuses to feel bad about them. Nor is she
befallen with great tragedy or lasting consequences – this film isn’t a warning
that sex will lead to nothing but STDs, pregnancy or some other dire
consequences. It is a movie that will likely make many very uncomfortable – it
doesn’t judge any of its characters for their actions, even if more than a few
of them would be considered horrific by most.
Minnie,
along with her younger sister Gretel, is being raised by Charlotte (Kristen
Wiig), who has just got out of a long term marriage with Minnie’s step father
Pascal (Christopher Meloni) and is apparently eager to make up for lost time.
The year is 1976, the place is San Francisco, and Charlotte starts partying
practically every night – with drugs and booze, and new boyfriend, Monroe
(Alexander Skarsgard). One night at a bar – which Charlotte pushed the pair
into going to toward – Minnie and Monroe get to talking, which leads to a lot more
than talking. She says he wants him to “fuck” her, and after a limited amount
of resistance, he agrees, starting an affair that will run through the movie.
Monroe is clearly a creep, but even with a 1970s mustache, he isn’t the one
dimensional kiddie rapist that we would expect to see in a movie like this.
He’s immature – perhaps as immature as Minnie – who manipulates and uses him as
much as he does with her. This certainly doesn’t excuse his behavior – but it
does allow for more context than we normally see in a movie like this. Besides,
Minnie doesn’t feel used – she feels liberated. Once she discovers how much she
likes sex, she continues to explore that – in a series of encounters that verge
on becoming dangerous, without ever quite getting there. When a classmate she
is sleeping with tells her that her “aggressiveness” scares him, he’s out of
the picture. When her first girlfriend tries to pimp her out for drugs, she’s
gone as well. Her sometimes partner in crime is Andrea (Miranda Bailey) – her
blonde best friend who is as willing as Minnie to push the boundaries past the
normally expected levels.
Now,
admittedly, this probably sounds like an exploitation picture like the
fictional Rochelle, Rochelle from Seinfeld about a “young girl’s strange erotic
journey from Milan to Minsk” – which in other hands is how this material
undoubtedly would have played. But the film is written for the screen and
directed by Marielle Heller and based on a novel by Phoebe Gloeckner, and they
keep the focus squarely on Minnie throughout. The camera respects Powley, the
actress, and Minnie the character with none of the usual shots we would get
here. The sex scenes – many of them have Powley at least partially dressed –
concentrate on her, and her pleasure, not the other way around. It locks into
her perspective, and stays there. The film works, in large part, because Powley
is so good as Minnie – she was in her 20s when he made the film, but looks like
a teenager in the film – with a kind of awkward walk (and more awkward run)
that at times make her seem more childlike – although throughout the course of
the film, she loses part of this. The movie works because it gets that being a
teenager is literally being caught in between being a child and being an adult
– which means sometimes you’re one, and sometimes you’re another, and often
those times crash into each other, as happens often here. It also works because
the two other key performances are excellent as well. If Kristen Wiig weren’t a
SNL veteran, she would probably get more credit for becoming an Indie Queen –
doing great work in a series of small movies. Here, he’s playing a woman who is
largely a narcissistic – but not a completely hideous one who doesn’t care
about her daughter – just one who doesn’t know what the hell is going on with
her. Skarsgaard is excellent as well – a kind of awkward teenage in a grown
man’s body – who drifts from one thing to another with “big plans” (he’s going
to start a mail order vitamin business and then buy a boat), when really all he
does is get drunk or stoned, and have sex with either Charlotte or Minnie. He’s
a creep – but doesn’t see himself that way.
The
Diary of a Teenage Girl doesn’t judge its characters, nor does it endorse their
behavior. It is an honest exploration of this girl discovering her sexuality,
and owning her decisions. It’s rare to see a movie like this – it walks a very
fine line between, and does it very well.
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