I don't get the overwhelming praise for this movie and I'm curious if anyone agrees with me. Here's my review:
http://freshfromthetheatre.com/review-the-diary-of-a-teenage-girl/
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Marielle Heller said on Fresh Air that when she read the book she felt like she was Minnie essentially because she too was always obsessed with sex and felt like she had a guy's perspective on sex. She also said that she was raised in a household where mother and father were together, so her view of males would be inherently more trusting than would a girl without a father. Based on her interviews I don't think the director even gets Minnie . She doesn't seem to understand that Minnie's choices were from a very troubled place, had nothing to do with healthy sexual liberation.
shareYou're going far too easy on it, especially with your comment that her sexual encounter with the step-dad is "comical" instead of disgusting.
I'd say this is the most uncomfortably repulsive and smutty "coming-of-age" film I've seen in quite in a while. The most offensive thing being its presentation of statutory rape as semi-legitimate on some perverse scale of relativism, as long as it's part of the healing process and helps you on your journey through adolescence and sexual awakening. The notion that a 15 year-old's sexual relationship with an adult can be excused for the sake of "self-discovery" and passed off "without apology" is contemptible. It only lazily and half-heartedly tries to connect the young girl's insecurities with her thoroughly dysfunctional and emotionally distant parents, and the movie fails precisely because it DOESN'T judge them and identify them as the pathetic screw-ups they are. The kind of movie I would recommend to Jared Fogle.
The notion that a 15 year-old's sexual relationship with an adult can be excused for the sake of "self-discovery" and passed off "without apology" is contemptible. It only lazily and half-heartedly tries to connect the young girl's insecurities with her thoroughly dysfunctional and emotionally distant parents, and the movie fails precisely because it DOESN'T judge them and identify them as the pathetic screw-ups they are.
OK, so the film includes a scene where Mom has her 15-year-old daughter drink and snort coke and apparently get so drunk that she's not aware that the party ends with her boyfriend having a threesome with her daughter and the daughter's best friend. And it has the girl's former stepfather (Dad to her half-sister) talking about how much of a complete immature wreck the Mom is.
On what freaking planet is the film failing to identify the Mom as a pathetic screw-up? I mean, that's actually in the film's dialogue. And judging the Mom is not the film's job, that's something that a good film leaves for the audience to do. And which, completely belying your own point, you had no trouble doing at all.
(To answer my question, it happens on a planet where you get so creeped out by the premise of the movie that you essentially stop watching it. And one of the points of the movie is that a relationship between an older man and teenage girl can be other things than creepy: in this case it's sad and pathetic, because Monroe is not being predatory, he's making a legitimate connection with someone his own emotional age.)
Prepare your minds for a new scale of physical, scientific values, gentlemen.share
This movie does not pound you over the head with a mallet and say " bad mom bad" or " evil Monroe evil" which is what it takes for some people To get it. This movie assumes that you are intelligent enough and aware enough to make your own moral judgements and conclusions. To me ,the evidence abounds that Minnie's mom ,Charlotte, is a class A screw up and that Monroe is as well. He goes a step further,however, and takes advantage of Minnie's trust and ignorance to suit his own fantasies of a rekindled adolescence free from adult responsibilities and awareness. Even Minnie's step dad seems warped in a very well real way when we find out he is the one responsible for Charlotte no longer touching her daughter in a loving and affectionate way. It was him who told Charlotte there was " something sexual " in the way Minnie seemed to need to be touched by her mother. I am still thinking about that remark and the effect it had on Charlotte and in turn on Minnie. Why was he interpreting simple affection and love between a mother and daughter as sexual? Was he ,too ,viewing Minnie with an eye toward her budding sexuality? Or was he just so uptight and closed off emotionally that he resented the affection Charlotte showed her daughter? Maybe he wanted her to seek affection from him and was jealous when she didn't. Regardless , the adults in this film were not given a free pass by any means.
Heller was making a film that was told through the prism of Minnie's very confused and half formulated moral compass . She experiments, she explores and she takes risks. When Minnie gets ready to pronounce judgement on Monroe and her mother we see only what her perspective allows us to see and hear. But it is more than enough to give us enough information to pronounce our open judgement if we are so inclined. There is nothing there to prevent any viewer from condemning Monroe and Charlotte out of hand and from feeling sorry got Minnie as she struggles with the consequences of having such irresponsible adults in her life. Or,if you are a different type of viewer,a less judgement one,you can see Minnie's messy confusing life and That of the adults in her world as a reflection of the general chaos that is human existence where mistakes,lack of judgement, irresponsibility and manipulative behavior are the facts of life and coming through that jungle of tangled emotions and murky morality is what a coming of age drama is all about
. Dustin Hoffman's chararcter ,Benjamin, had an affair with Mrs. Robinson,his eventual girlfriend's/ fiancé's mother in The Graduate over 40 years ago and there was no hue and cry ,even at those times over the fact that an adult woman had seduced a young male teenager and had a prolonged affair with him. She was not condemned as an evil villainess and people didn't refuse to see the movie because what she did was wrong. They knew it was wrong and moved on to empathize with and take part in Bejamin's journey. Such is what DOATG asks of it's viewers. Those who can do it will get the most out of this film. Those that can't are doomed to disappointment not just by this film but by life as well. Seldom are those who deserve punishment punished or even made to face the consequences of their immoral and irresponsible behavior.
This movie does not pound you over the head with a mallet and say " bad mom bad" or " evil Monroe evil" which is what it takes for some people To get it. This movie assumes that you are intelligent enough and aware enough to make your own moral judgements and conclusions. To me ,the evidence abounds that Minnie's mom ,Charlotte, is a class A screw up and that Monroe is as well. He goes a step further,however, and takes advantage of Minnie's trust and ignorance to suit his own fantasies of a rekindled adolescence free from adult responsibilities and awareness. Even Minnie's step dad seems warped in a very well real way when we find out he is the one responsible for Charlotte no longer touching her daughter in a loving and affectionate way. It was him who told Charlotte there was " something sexual " in the way Minnie seemed to need to be touched by her mother. I am still thinking about that remark and the effect it had on Charlotte and in turn on Minnie. Why was he interpreting simple affection and love between a mother and daughter as sexual? Was he ,too ,viewing Minnie with an eye toward her budding sexuality? Or was he just so uptight and closed off emotionally that he resented the affection Charlotte showed her daughter? Maybe he wanted her to seek affection from him and was jealous when she didn't. Regardless , the adults in this film were not given a free pass by any means.
Heller was making a film that was told through the prism of Minnie's very confused and half formulated moral compass . She experiments, she explores and she takes risks. When Minnie gets ready to pronounce judgement on Monroe and her mother we see only what her perspective allows us to see and hear. But it is more than enough to give us enough information to pronounce our open judgement if we are so inclined. There is nothing there to prevent any viewer from condemning Monroe and Charlotte out of hand and from feeling sorry got Minnie as she struggles with the consequences of having such irresponsible adults in her life. Or,if you are a different type of viewer,a less judgement one,you can see Minnie's messy confusing life and That of the adults in her world as a reflection of the general chaos that is human existence where mistakes,lack of judgement, irresponsibility and manipulative behavior are the facts of life and coming through that jungle of tangled emotions and murky morality is what a coming of age drama is all about
. Dustin Hoffman's chararcter ,Benjamin, had an affair with Mrs. Robinson,his eventual girlfriend's/ fiancé's mother in The Graduate over 40 years ago and there was no hue and cry ,even at those times over the fact that an adult woman had seduced a young male teenager and had a prolonged affair with him. She was not condemned as an evil villainess and people didn't refuse to see the movie because what she did was wrong. They knew it was wrong and moved on to empathize with and take part in Bejamin's journey. Such is what DOATG asks of it's viewers. Those who can do it will get the most out of this film. Those that can't are doomed to disappointment not just by this film but by life as well. Seldom are those who deserve punishment punished or even made to face the consequences of their immoral and irresponsible behavior.
Maggiesview: The character Ben Braddock in The Graduate was not a "young male teenager" (which would be age 13 or 14), or even an intermediate male teenager (age 15, 16, or 17) or an older male teenager (age 18 or 19). Rather, he was a man in his early twenties, a recent college graduate.
shareI stand corrected l. Here,all these years I have believed that he was a high school graduate. I guess that's because in the sicietyvI grew up in graduation parties were only held for high school graduation not college. Thanks.
And judging the Mom is not the film's job, that's something that a good film leaves for the audience to do. And which, completely belying your own point, you had no trouble doing at all.
The film ... takes the opposite approach. It excuses all of these people and tries to pass them off charming, quirky, and lovable. It even goes as far as to depict their behavior as justifiable, just a healthy component of helping a teenage girl grow up.
Prepare your minds for a new scale of physical, scientific values, gentlemen.share
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What may or may not be considered groundbreaking about this film has nothing to do with Belle having seen with her mother's much boyfriend. It has to do with a coming of age film that's told through the eyes of a 15 year old girl without judging or moralizing about her actions,thoughts or feelings. We get her story through her 15 year old point of view. The movie is careful not to judge,preach or paint it's 15 year old protagonist as a slut or punish her for enjoying sex with her mother's boyfriend and boys more her own age.
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