It’s been almost three weeks since I’ve seen this movie, but Bestie is going to have an aneurysm if I’m three behind, so I’m cleaning up some review before going out to see The Creator opening weekend. Rachel Sennott has the glorious distinction of being both the writer and executive producer of this film as well as one of the stars, and if that name rings any bells, it’s because this is not her first film of the year that we’ve reviewed glowingly (that’d be Bodies Bodies Bodies). The premise is deliciously screwball and was successful in getting Friend who “only sees 4 films a year, one each way to and from her family home in Georgia twice a year” to break that rule to see this with Wife the weekend after I saw it: two queer girls in high school (“you had me at queer,” Friend said) make a fight club (“You have me at fight club,” she adds) in order to date hot girls. The humor is absurdist, the script is fast-paced, machine gun fire jokes, often improvised as evidenced by the end credit outtakes, and the more I learn about the lore of the making of this film, the more there is to like.
Wife tends to like films with upsidedown scripts, where everyone straight-facedly can decry “F— me gently with a chainsaw” or “Cheese and crackers” and move on with the conversation without further explanation: think Heathers, think Rage in Placid Lake, Addams Family Reunion. Bottoms has those moments of off-kilter oddball cult lines that one can imagine repeating as fastidiously as any Mean Girls meme in a year if there is a God. The first time you notice a student in a cage in class you’ll raise an eyebrow but when the principal has defended the manhood of the star quarterback for a third time, it feels earned and surrealist.
Hot scenes are hot. Awkward scenes will make you want to claw your eyes out on behalf of the transcendentally nervous Ayo Edebiri. It is in every way the love child of Assassination Nation and Booksmart. One and a half Babadooks.
