Bottoms-Movie Review
Watched the film Bottoms recently. I didn’t fully understand what this film would be about, but the cast seemed interesting so I watched it. Honestly a little nuts, but in a way I absolutely enjoyed. This is a 2020s Roger Waters movie. There’s just a lot going on here and for the most part, I thought it was great. This feels like a film that is really under the radar in some ways. I had heard about it in passing, but I never knew it was this good.
So here’s the run down: PJ (Rachel Sennot) and Josie (Ayo Edebiri) are extremely concerned with having sex with these two cheerleaders, Isabelle (Havana Rose-Liu) and Britanny (Kai Gerber). To do this, they end up starting a fight club for women, under the pretense of preparing women to defend themselves from their rival school. It gets over the top pretty much right away. The fight club is almost brutal and this football rivalry seems like a joke, then turns out to be even more outlandish when played straight. Throughout the course of the movie, the girls fight each other several times, commit acts of terrorism, and then end up facing off with the rival football team themselves in an action packed, absurd finale.
Overall, I had no major gripes with this film. It’s well cast, well shot and very well written. There’s all the hallmarks of a good story and the key moments really stand out. It could be argued to be standard a teenage/high school film that wandered out of time, landing in the mid 2020s instead of late 2000s. But in many ways it’s interaction with those films is more complex than simple inspiration. The whole “kids realistically beating the shit out of each other for fun” is definitely out of line and yet as far as violence goes, that barely scratches the surface.
Bottoms parodies a lot of things, but at its heart it feels like a satire. When you watch a high school comedy that places sexuality at it’s heart, you expect some raunch and some spice. But in this film, the violence is just so over the top, it makes the sexuality feel quite tame by comparison. There are literally deaths in this movie (spoiler), and they’re treated with the same concern as a dropped ice cube. It’s great.
I think the main cast is great. Rachel Sennot owns her role as PJ. Her portrayal is confident, measured and a tad chaotic, working a balance that comes across as very human and understandable. Ayo Edebiri does Ayo Edebiri things. She stutters, she finds her pauses, she slows down her speech. The body language is phenomenal, with the perfect mix of anxious and awkward. Sometimes with her, it’s hard to tell if every character she plays is similar or if she is just playing a version of the same character, but either way, it’s a great character.
Havana Rose-Liu does a good job as Isabelle, rendering a cheer leader who is more than just a pretty face, but not so much to it leans into the trope. Kaia Gerber is black coffee, very robust in her playing of Britanny. It’s hard to say if this is a great acting job (it’s her first role), but it’s definitely a memorable performance. The first step to playing characters is playing one, and she did a fine job. I thought her deadpan vibe fit the movie extremely well and complimented the dynamics of the main characters.
It’s been said that the age of the comedy is dead, and that may be true, but this one is definitely a diamond in the rough for these times. It’s consistently funny, and it creates an atmosphere laced with ludicrous, often toxic dynamics that are a joy to see unfold onscreen. From the horny fight club scenes to the depraved and bombastic football team, the personalities and factions in this movie hold some weight.
Script? Watertight. This movie is short and it goes by fast. ACT 1, ACT 2, BAM! ACT 3, fin. It’s a masterclass in storytelling, and each scene serves a purpose. It’s almost too by the book. You watch some scenes and go “oh, this is where they’re setting up this to happen.” And often, you’re right…but with a film that’s as unpredictable and frankly, unhinged, as this one, you never know how things are gonna actually go down.
Visually and aesthetically, I liked a lot of the choices the film made. The lighting and filming definitely placed the film in a contemporary setting while the more straight forward angles felt like a standard high school movie fare. The effects in this movie (which got a workout) are very good, grounded enough not to break the suspension of disbelief, but theatric enough to pack a punch. The overall production of this film is consistent throughout, a well-oiled machine fueled by a strong identity.
What is it about, thematically, you may ask? Well…a lot of things. But they’re not so tied in they make your head hurt, they hang out on the surface. Queer culture, especially within high schools, takes up some emphasis. Toxic masculinity is an element explored with the football team. But it’s also subverted, with the football players being some of the biggest babies in the movie. Violence is unchained from its male associations and given a groovy and nasty feminine voice. The whole thing is a well-constructed, shiny art film with some nice names, and it’s a a fun film to watch whether you are looking to get brainy or just relax.
I would recommend this film to a lot of people, probably more than I initially thought. I feel like everyone has liked a film with some common elements as this, and that it has a lot to offer to the casual viewer. It’s funny, raunchy, violent and breezy, all tastefully blended together with a grade A script and excellent direction. If you have an hour and some change to spare, consider giving Bottoms a spin.
