"Eighth Grade" Review
I love watching coming-of-age movies. So this is going to be an extremely biased review.
"Eighth Grade" is directed by Bo Burnham and it follows Kayla (Elsie Fisher) in her last week of middle school.
I love this movie. Burnham has a deep understanding of late adolescence. It's such a crucial but overwhelming time in a person's life and this movie captures that intimately. It knows when to be funny and when to use humour to undercut tension and to enhance the drama. Although I found myself laughing at this poor girl, I also found her endearing and sweet. She has a social media persona that she uses and that provides a beautiful contrast to how awkwardly her character behaves around other people in her daily life and is a great insight into her character.
Elsie Fisher is FUCKING INCREDIBLE. She's able to so effortlessly articulate Burnham's meticulously idiosyncratic script and directions on camera. She's hilarious and vulnerable and her presence moved me to tears. Josh Hamilton is excellent as the father and compliments Fisher's performance. There're a few scenes in this where it hit me hard. You'll know what I'm referring to if you've seen it.
I want to praise the movie's use of practical naturalistic-looking lighting. The inside of houses are lit like normal houses with different lighting temperatures. When Kayla is on her phone, the lighting is actually coming from her phone and she's actually reacting to Instagram and DMs in real time. I also want to give huge props to the makeup department for making the characters look like kids. Kayla and most of the other youths in the movie have an acne, or cover it up with makeup. It's this attention to detail that I really appreciated and helped to make the movie more immersive than it already was.
I cannot recommend Eighth Grade enough. It's an important film for this era and I can't think of a reason not to see it. Young people and older viewers would definitely find it highly insightful and the fact that it's rated R is dumb. Kids can see super violent action movies but not see movies about characters like themselves talk about sex. This is such a beautiful and honest take on growing up. It's not pretty and it's often crude but that's why it feels so realistic. If you or you know somebody who's a teenager or an adolescent, show them this movie. They might need it more than you think.
Gucci!