Two light dramedies where young protagonists come of age, but only one is worth watching…
Very Good Girls…Whew, this is not a good movie, but it wants to be. It wants to be an earnest exploration of sexuality coming into conflict with friendship as two “very good girls” (Dakota Fanning and Elisabeth Olsen) fall for the same guy in the summer before college, while both have major parental shake-ups. However, for a limited-range indie, the material doesn’t feel true enough. Would both of these girls really be so invested in a guy they just met when their parents and family structure are crumbling around them? Plus, the movie falls back a little too heavily on its soundtrack to provide the feeling. And even though Fanning and Olsen are terrific actresses, they’re not given much to work with, and Olsen in particular isn’t really young enough for this part. [Although apparently she’s become engaged to the lead actor from this movie, so what do I know?] Grade: C
A Birder’s Guide to Everything…It’s an equally sunny, slight dramedy about a high school boy on the day before a parental shake-up: his widowed father is about to get remarried to a perfect woman, but she’s still not the boy’s mom so he’s ambivalent. Oh, and the protagonist is heavily involved in the very…”specific” world of birding and thinks he might have found a thought-to-be-extinct species of duck.
Now this film rings true, and I know people might think I just like it better because it’s about a male’s growing up and I can relate to that more, but it honestly does feel more specific and honest. It doesn’t hurt that Katie Chang (as the lead’s potential love interest) and Ben Kingsley (as a wry birding mentor) are around to give great support, and that this film is actually better than the Steve Martin starring “A Good Year” at capturing the “excitement” of birding and the kind of person who would be excited by it. Grade: B+