When I was in the eighth
grade, the Internet as we know it was just becoming the domineering force it is
now. Just about everyone I knew had a computer and/or a cellphone, social media
was on the rise, YouTube was in its infancy, and memes and Internet stars were
beginning to make mainstream traction. But compared to how ubiquitous they are
now and how integrated they are into the life of your average millennial, it’s
almost like we’re five generations apart instead of one. Eight Grade is one of the only coming of age movies I’ve seen that
acknowledges the important role this technology plays in the modern youth, but
unlike certain films, doesn’t treat it as a complete negative. Considering that
director and comedy musician Bo Burnham got his start posting songs on YouTube
when he was sixteen, that should come as no surprise.
Our story follows Kayla (Elsie
Fisher), a shy, awkward thirteen-year-old during her last week of middle school.
In the waning days before her graduation, she does her best to make it through
the gauntlet of the middle school experience in one piece. She’s forced to
attend the pool party of a popular girl (Catherine Oliviere) who doesn’t like
her, attempts to gain the attention of her crush (Luke Prael), is constantly
embarrassed by her doting father (Josh Hamilton), and makes nice with a
friendly high-schooler (Emily Robinson) during a shadow trip. Unbeknownst to
most of her peers, she has a YouTube channel where she dishes out life advice.
Whether or not anyone actually watches her videos is unknown. Whether she’s
good at applying her own advice to her actual life is up for debate.
In a sense, Eighth Grade is a slice of life tale in
the vein of Lady Bird and The Edge of Seventeen; one that doesn’t
necessarily have an overarching plot, but rather follows our heroine around
through the trials and tribulations of adolescence with an emphasis on the
mundane parts in between. There are two factors that separate it from the
others. One, that Kayla is both younger and far more likeable and easier to
sympathize with than Lady Bird or Nadine were, and two, the way it frames the
role of technology in her life. When we see an auditorium of kids glued to
their phones, or Kayla scrolling through the waves of Instagram, Twitter and
Snapchat, it’s not treated as a condemnation but as a fact of life. Kayla’s
YouTube vlogs aren’t seen through the lens of vanity or fame-whoring, but
rather as a personal therapy. In fact, the narrative hook of the film is
coinciding the advice she gives in her videos with how it applies to her real
life. For example, when she’s coerced into attending a pool party for a popular
girl that doesn’t care for her, it’s overlayed with Kayla talking about “putting
yourself out there”.
Although the Internet is an
omnipresent factor, it doesn’t deter from the fact that the current generation
still deals with the same struggles that their parents and older siblings went
through. There’s even a poignant moment where a teenage boy four years her senior
argues that she had Snapchat at a younger age than him was like the difference
the War had between the Greatest Generation and the Baby Boomers, even though everything
we see her go through argues to the contrary. Elsie Fisher does an exquisite
job of walking the tightrope of making her character likeable and believable.
If you’re not a fan of cringe
comedy, this movie’s not for you, although I suspect it’s cringiest moments are
by design to convey the embarrassment a real preteen would experience in such
situations. The pool party scene is chock full of them, but we also squirm in
our seats at the adult’s attempts to relate to the cool kids, like when a woman
says “it’s gonna be lit” in a sex ed video, or when the principal dabs before a
presentation. The bulk of this comes from Kayla’s loving but profoundly uncool
dad, with their interactions giving us some of the movie’s sweetest moments.
All he wants is for his little girl to see herself the way he sees her, and
through the way she faces the various challenges life throws at her, we begin
to see her that way, too.
Bottom line, Eighth Grade is a funny, empathetic film
that every pre-teen should see. (Don’t let the bullshit R-rating dissuade you.
It’s only there because there are more than a few swear words.) The drama of
high school has been overdone and overanalyzed in film before, so it’s nice to
see a film that acknowledges that middle school can be just as tumultuous. The
best thing about eighth grade is that it ends. And although Eighth Grade doesn’t overstay its welcome
with its 93-minute runtime, you’ll wish it didn’t.
8/10
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