MGM
It ’s not a stretch to say that 2023 was a pretty great year for movies . Betweensuccesses likeOppenheimerandBarbie , acclaimed ducky likePoor ThingsandAnatomy of a Fall , andunexpected hits likeGodzilla Minus OneandAnyone but You , the film industry thrived last year . However , as unremarkably happen , more than a few photographic film earned far more acclaim than they should have , at least in this author ’s persuasion . I ’ve written already aboutmy disfavour for Emerald Fennell’sSaltburn , but that was a dissentious pic that had far more detractors than just me . On the contrary , Emma Seligman ’s stripling comedyBottomsreceived near - world-wide acclaim , and I ca n’t , for the life of me , empathize why .
Bottomsisn’t necessarily tough , stringently address ; it ’s not a true execration like , say , GhostedorThe Flash . However , it ’s also not the teen triumph it was inunct to be by most critics and the internet . or else , it ’s a rather average movie that is not nearly as insurgent or clever as it act to be . In fact , liken to other entries in the dingy teen music genre , it ’s sorely mediocre , and the more praise it got , the more I dislike it . And while “ hate ” might be a solid word , particularly when talking about a movie , it ’s a pretty succinct , if somewhat magnified , fashion to key out my feelings towardsBottoms .
MGM
What is it exactly that we’re looking at here?
Bottomsfollows two high schoolhouse seniors , PJ ( Rachel Senott ) and Josie ( Ayo Edebiri ) . They ’re unpopular , lesbians , virgins , and heroic not to be . They have crush on two popular cheerleader , Brittany ( Kaia Gerber ) and Isabel ( Havana Rose Liu ) , but their existence perish unnoticed by the beautiful girl . While take care a local bazaar , Isabel search refuge in Josie ’s cable car while in a scrap with her dim - witted quarterback swain Jeff ( Nicholas Galitzine ) . When Josie attempts to motor aside , she softly bumps Jeff ’s knee joint with the car , sending him into an overdone tirade where he fakes a more severe injury that leads to him using crutches . threaten to be expelled , Josie and PJ pretend Jeff ’s injury was stimulate during practice for a “ distaff combat club , ” which they begin to both save up themselves and attempt to abstract up with the pop little girl who fall in .
The assumption itself is nothing out of the average ; if anything , it has a few things get for it . Like most other middling movies , it ’s the execution whereBottomsfails . For starters , no one in this moving-picture show wait like an actual high schooler . True , this is a symptom of Hollywood itself , but it ’s especially unhinge inBottoms , a movie whose entire assumption revolves around randy teenaged girl doing their utmost to control their out - of - ascendency hormone . But when the two protagonists look like Gender Studies majors straight out of NYU rather than fresh - face teen who can scarce contain their hot pants , how can we possibly corrupt it ? The same issue applies to every other “ teen ” in the cast , especially Galitzine , who , weeks beforeBottomspremiered , was play a British prince in his mid-20s far more convincingly .
My one major issue withBottomsis how subversive it tries to be while sticking to the same formulaic approach of your average teen movie . Do n’t get me untimely , Bottomsis quite violent , but even its gore is uninspired , crashing in a way we ’ve seen countless times before , fromKick - Assto the constant slasher moving picture that derive out every yr . Its depicting of queerness is also remarkably faineant ; it ’s play to show teen girls being horny , especially since it ’s so rarified for movies to really go there . However , the film tries very heavy to annul any grayish area with its two admirer , to the full stop where they fall across as stereotypes rather than to the full fleshed - out characters .
And what a shame because Sennott and Edebiri are game in this movie , and I ’m sure they would ’ve have it away to have explored PJ and Josie ’s darker English . ButBottomsisn’t relate with that ; it require to be laughable and daring while remaining digestible enough to have mass appeal . So what ’s the point ? If you depend at the really subversive entranceway in queer cinema — fromPink FlamingostoBut I ’m a Cheerleader , a filmBottomsshamelessly tries to emulate , failing every footmark of the way — there ’s actual courage behind them . They do n’t want to please ; they want to discomfort and fire .
Where ’s that energy inBottoms ? Its idea of “ shock ” is root in painfully 2000s whimsy of what the word means : ancestry ! Teen sexual activity with adults ! Girls being overtly horny ! It ’s all so boring ; this entire movie was publicise as the antithesis of deadening , andthisis the good it can do , really ? It ’s a true “ we must alert the church senior ” moment because of how run - of - the - mill and unimaginative it all is .
Is this supposed to be funny?
My other major number withBottomsis simple : it ’s not queer . Ittriesto be funny , desperately so , but it go wrong because of its so - so screenplay . Every antic is painfully obvious , and the picture show herald it before the actor has even deliver it . The female competitiveness club , seemingly the plot ’s independent gimmick , is underused , developing , and far less inventive than it should be . It ’s there for a few lazy sequences , many of which seem straight out of anSNLskitfrom the 2000s when they should ’ve seemed flat out of aMadTVsketch from the 2000s .
The comedy inBottomsfeels look , someone ’s distressingly literal idea of what it means to be “ provocative ” while still assay to be accessible . It ’s no surprise that the film’sfunniest and most viral momentwasimprovised by Edebiri : her disorderly , dire ramble feel genuine and raw , something sorely missing from the repose of the pic .
Bottomstook quite a while to premier in Mexico , where I live . For weeks , all I read on societal medium was how this film was raunchy , liberated , and unlike anything we ’ve ever ascertain before . Imagine my surprisal when I finally see it and found an unfunny and rather safe adolescent rom - com whose entire shtick seemed to be “ Superbad , but with lesbians . ” Audiences overhyping a movie has been the downfall of one too many labor — I ’ve also written aboutmy disappointment withRaiders of the Lost Ark , a movie often treated as the 2d coming , but that I found boring at unspoilt and aggravate at worst .
It does n’t avail that every review nowadays seems reactionary and excruciatingly extremist — the words “ masterpiece , ” “ Graeco-Roman , ” and “ triumph ” are overuse , especially on societal media . I ’m certain I ’m not the only somebody to say about how a movie is the expert entranceway into whatever musical genre it happens to belong to , only to discover it ’s a upstanding , yet just groundbreaking cinematic effort .
Bottomssuffered from this fate ; reviews out of South by Southwest paid it every compliment in the book and inunct it as a modern classic before it even had a press release date- Yet , these honestly pompous reassessment barely do a movie any good — if anything , it ’s the opposite . We should learn to appreciate movies for what they are rather than trying to make them what we need them to be .
Bottoms, indeed
In my article aboutSaltburn , I write about how I found it ridiculously dire , and that ’s exactly what I think ofBottoms . Much like its protagonists , Bottomsis desperate to be democratic , to sit around with the cool Thomas Kid of the teen genre and boldly announce that queer comedies now have a seat on the table . But its queerness is conventional and scarcely interesting , more a merchandising tool rather than a thematic mainstay . If the movie ’s lonesome claim to classical condition is “ we want more odd moving-picture show there , ” then its approach has been blemished since its inception .
Ironically , undersurface ‘ willingness to compromise makes it improbable to arise into a genuine cult classic . Its unruffled approach seems uninteresting , especially in hindsight , and embarrassingly tame next to works likeRocky Horroror even something likeJennifer ’s Body . At the closing of the twenty-four hours , and unlike what has been said , Bottomsis not surprising or refreshing , and it ’s surely not rummy . It ’s silly and uneasy , although not one-half as much as Seligman and Sennott ’s former quislingism , the in reality interesting and cleverShiva Baby . And the sad part is it absolutely could ’ve been everything it believe itself to be if only it had really stress .
Alas , much like countless other teen comedy before it , Bottomssettled for doing the desolate lower limit and is thus stick to to suffer the same destiny they have , derive into the depths of some streaming Robert William Service , hoping to be seen by some unsuspecting soul seek to satiate the void on a boring Friday nighttime . They ’re good off watchingHeathersorJennifer ’s Bodyagain .
Bottomsis available tostream onAmazon Prime VideoandMGM+ .
