Unanimous Praise for Greta Gerwig’s Lady Bird, Opens Tomorrow with 100% on RT

Lady Bird was one of the favorites in Telluride. It should do very well with critics heading into the season, I will predict that it earns at least one major prize from the New York Film critics, if not Best Picture and Best Director then surely Best Screenplay or Best Actress. The majority of Oscar pundits are also predicting it as a Best Picture/Screenplay/Actress nominee as well.

I wasn’t one of those who connected with the film. I’m that one person in a sea of hundreds who didn’t but that really doesn’t matter – the film has a perfect Rotten Tomatoes score and is about to take flight in a big way, as the reviews illustrate, calling it “delightful,” “Warm,” “Wonderful,” and on and on it goes:

AO Scott–

The script is exceptionally well-written, full of wordplay and lively argument. Every line sounds like something a person might actually say, which means that the movie is also exceptionally well acted. It is not too quick to soothe the abrasions of class and family. The McPhersons are hardly poor, but the daily toll of holding onto the ragged middle of the middle class is evident in Larry’s melancholy and Marion’s ill humor. They are a loving family, but their steadfast devotion to one another doesn’t always express itself as kindness. They are real people, honestly portrayed.

That might make “Lady Bird” sound drab and dutiful, but it’s the opposite. I wish I could convey to you just how thrilling this movie is. I wish I could quote all of the jokes and recount the best offbeat bits. I’d tell you about the sad priest and the football coach, about the communion wafers and the Sacramento real estate, about the sly, jaunty editing rhythms, the oddly apt music choices and the way Ms. Ronan drops down on the grass in front of her house when she receives an important piece of mail. I’m tempted to catalog the six different ways the ending can make you cry.

I’ll settle for one: the bittersweet feeling of having watched someone grow in front of your eyes, into a different and in some ways improved version of herself. In life, that’s a messy, endless process, which is one reason we need movies. Or to put it another way, even though Lady Bird will never be perfect, “Lady Bird” is.

Even Kyle Smith liked it:

Lady Bird is the rare teen movie that vindicates the world’s exasperating moms.