It takes over half a century to bring Judy Blume’s 1970 coming-of-age novel ARE YOU THERE GOD? IT’S ME, MARGARET onto the screen. Why it takes such a long time? What could be the intractable taboo(s) regarding an 11-year-old girl’s innocuous life in the suburbs? She has a pair of loving parents, she is capable of orienting herself in a new school. The answer is a telling reflection of USA’s puritanical clutch and religion mentality.
Margaret Simon (Fortson), who is displaced from NYC to New Jersey suburbia, her new school-year is peppered with pre-adolescent anxieties and a religious quandary, hence its title, which refers to Margaret’s frequent prayer to vent her frustration and confusion.
ARE YOU THERE GOD?… marks Kelly Fremon Craig’s second feature after the similar-themed THE EDGE OF SEVENTEEN (2016), and it perspicaciously retains the novel’s candidness of discussing and portraying girly subject matters like menarche (taboo No. 1), bosom concerns (funniest bit here!), boy crush (one doesn’t need to be conformable to other’s taste) and sisterly bonds - which are more than heuristic to young girls of that age, and the freedom to choose one’s religion (taboo No. 2).
The main rub is that Margaret’s father Herb (an mildly amicable Safdie) is Jewish and her mother Barbara (McAdams, giving a radiant, angelic mother and wife her essential blood and flesh) is Catholic. It is further compounded by the fact that Barbara’s parents have disowned her when she and Herb tied the knot, which also primes for the climax when they finally come to visit the family for the first time, then confronted by Herb’s mother Sylvia (Bates, who manages to compensate grandma’s larger-than-life outrageousness with copious affection), their religious dissension pressurizes Margaret to a befitting hissy fit. However, the film sticks its landing with a heart-warming celebration of Margaret’s rite of passage, and that supernal mother-daughter bond is all a teenage girl could ever dream of!
As the director, Craig tactfully downplays the dramatic elements and opts for a heartfelt experience through Margaret’s impressible perspective. Her shifting friendship with classmate Nancy (Graham) is particularly insightful, everyone has the freedom to choose their friends, even a white lie can reveal something objectionable and it is never too late to right one’s wrong impression and preconception.
Kudos to the casting director for cherry-picking Forston as the lead, whose cherubic cuteness and unaffected responsiveness is key to bring Margaret into animation. Like the film itself, Forston manages to exude exquisiteness out of the mundanity. ARE YOU THERE GOD?… is an exemplar of felicity, liberality and honesty in conceiving a sensible story for pre-teens, for whom a mandatory viewing is highly commended.
referential entries: Olivia Wilde’s BOOKSMART (2019, 6.8/10); Eliza Hittman’s NEVER RARELY SOMETIMES ALWAYS (2020, 7.5/10); Bo Burnham’s EIGHTH GRADE (2018, 7.1/10).
在这里，你可以真的看到青春期的黎明，诠释那些在发展心理学上的令人眼花缭乱的冲突与成长，好的电影其意义在于让人的生活经验扩展几倍。尽管你可能掌握不少关于发展的关键词，如果不是刻意观察，也是不太可能拿捏住这些女孩子的变化。n 这个时候，体像的关注从未这么强烈，以致于孩子们行为有些魔怔（当然是笑死人那种），而且作者竟然没有忘记女性早熟的体像带来的消极结果，还有那些亲密小团体的秘密。重点在于渐渐脱离家庭形成自我，越来越受到同辈的强烈影响，角色的混乱、冲突、妒忌。当然，埃里克森会说，这个阶段她们的任务就是在这些混乱的角色中找到同一性。n 我们不大可能在我们的文化体系里展示这些深刻的变化，当然，这些发展是相似的，是人生理上和心理上最重要的转变，它是可以很快乐，很生活的演绎的。
It takes over half a century to bring Judy Blume’s 1970 coming-of-age novel ARE YOU THERE GOD? IT’S ME, MARGARET onto the screen. Why it takes such a long time? What could be the intractable taboo(s) regarding an 11-year-old girl’s innocuous life in the suburbs? She has a pair of loving parents, she is capable of orienting herself in a new school. The answer is a telling reflection of USA’s puritanical clutch and religion mentality.
Margaret Simon (Fortson), who is displaced from NYC to New Jersey suburbia, her new school-year is peppered with pre-adolescent anxieties and a religious quandary, hence its title, which refers to Margaret’s frequent prayer to vent her frustration and confusion.
ARE YOU THERE GOD?… marks Kelly Fremon Craig’s second feature after the similar-themed THE EDGE OF SEVENTEEN (2016), and it perspicaciously retains the novel’s candidness of discussing and portraying girly subject matters like menarche (taboo No. 1), bosom concerns (funniest bit here!), boy crush (one doesn’t need to be conformable to other’s taste) and sisterly bonds - which are more than heuristic to young girls of that age, and the freedom to choose one’s religion (taboo No. 2).
The main rub is that Margaret’s father Herb (an mildly amicable Safdie) is Jewish and her mother Barbara (McAdams, giving a radiant, angelic mother and wife her essential blood and flesh) is Catholic. It is further compounded by the fact that Barbara’s parents have disowned her when she and Herb tied the knot, which also primes for the climax when they finally come to visit the family for the first time, then confronted by Herb’s mother Sylvia (Bates, who manages to compensate grandma’s larger-than-life outrageousness with copious affection), their religious dissension pressurizes Margaret to a befitting hissy fit. However, the film sticks its landing with a heart-warming celebration of Margaret’s rite of passage, and that supernal mother-daughter bond is all a teenage girl could ever dream of!
As the director, Craig tactfully downplays the dramatic elements and opts for a heartfelt experience through Margaret’s impressible perspective. Her shifting friendship with classmate Nancy (Graham) is particularly insightful, everyone has the freedom to choose their friends, even a white lie can reveal something objectionable and it is never too late to right one’s wrong impression and preconception.
Kudos to the casting director for cherry-picking Forston as the lead, whose cherubic cuteness and unaffected responsiveness is key to bring Margaret into animation. Like the film itself, Forston manages to exude exquisiteness out of the mundanity. ARE YOU THERE GOD?… is an exemplar of felicity, liberality and honesty in conceiving a sensible story for pre-teens, for whom a mandatory viewing is highly commended.
referential entries: Olivia Wilde’s BOOKSMART (2019, 6.8/10); Eliza Hittman’s NEVER RARELY SOMETIMES ALWAYS (2020, 7.5/10); Bo Burnham’s EIGHTH GRADE (2018, 7.1/10).
【主观评分：7.5分】
【海报&基础信息】????
【剧情概述】????
讲少女成长烦恼的一部简单流水账小电影，起源是女主的父亲升职了，然后搬家转校到了一个全新的地方，女孩自言自语倾诉烦恼和郁闷的故事，中间穿插了女主与父母祖母辈宗教信仰观念的冲突争执、同龄小团伙的谣言霸凌和解、邻家男孩的情愫萌动。
【评价感受】????
【印象深刻】????
这里笑喷，我认知空白地的少女成长世界
虽然不同国籍不同文化家庭 但女主青春期关于自己身体的变化的期待 对同龄女性发育更快 因为道听途说听到的消息 对其产生的莫名的恶意和嫉妒 对异性产生的性懵懂 这些看似细碎渺小 但其实意义重大的第一次都让我感同身受 她们需要在适合的年龄得到性教育 得到父母家人的爱和尊重 得到朋友的支持和陪伴 得到属于自己的信仰 无论那个信仰是什么 我希望当时的我在这个年龄阶段有这些疑惑和烦恼时 也能得到父母亲人 朋友等人的帮助 但那个时候成绩就已经是所有了 我也不过是亲戚和老师口中内向不爱说话 应该开朗一点的坐在前排的矮个子女生。
还有妈妈 放弃自己的热爱的工作变成全职妈妈 绝对是世界上最最最令人不值的事情 那种看到美丽的飞鸟落在窗前 兴奋的拿起画笔的样子 比她在厨房里对着陌生的锅具看见黑糊糊的烤鸡有意思多了
最后 女主口中的上帝是真的信仰吗 我觉得每人都会有自己的理解 在我的理解中 女主口中的上帝是一位睿智可靠的善于倾听朋友 她会把自己的烦恼和愿望都说给它听 希望它能答疑解惑理解自己 同时得到祝福 但这种信仰远远达不到女主妈妈的父母他们那种程度 那种可以为了信仰抛弃女儿的程度。
玛格丽特是即将随父母从纽约乔迁到新泽西的小学生。比起和亲密的奶奶分离以及需要适应新的环境，玛格丽特最重要面对的状况是从儿童到青少年的转变。作为女孩，一切都是新的未知的变化。
首先，玛格丽特在新的学校环境加入了四人同学小团体，进入青春期，第一步并不是自己身体的变化，而是，从得到认同开始。为此，玛格丽特去买内衣，在她身体发育并不需要时。但是，她的社会属性身份非常需要，因为这是小团体统一的要求。她们还一起开秘密会议，一起讨论班里的男生。玛格丽特小心翼翼，总不希望自己另类，极力让自己变得和大家一样，因为这样是“正常的”。
在步入青春期前，少女对自己的定位是较为模糊的，需要找到某种认同感，而随着电影发展，玛格丽特开始慢慢意识到属于自己独特的感受和判断，开始和小团体分离，从而表现出个性。电影最后她主动结识原来四人团体排斥，而自己觉得相处愉快的一名高个女生，按照自己的意愿选择朋友，从共性到个性的成熟，离不开电影另一个纬度。
就是玛格丽特家庭信仰的矛盾，她的母亲是基督教家庭，因为和信仰犹太教背景的结婚，而和被迫和父母断绝了关系，以至于玛格丽特没有见过自己的外公外婆。玛格丽特对宗教非常好奇，和奶奶也去过教会，但是她总觉得少了一些什么。那些仪式和好听的音乐无法触动玛格丽特的内心。
在一次家庭聚会里，她的外公外婆和奶奶都参加了，双方果然因为信仰不同而大吵起来。这让玛格丽特对宗教的作用产生了自己独立的判断，她给邀请自己参加宗教调研活动的老师写信，说宗教并不像在教会宣称的那样，对她而言，反而带来了很多冲突，制造了家庭的不愉快，玛格丽特成长了，她从自己的经历中产生了属于自我的认识。
从孩童到少女，是每一个女生都经历过的身心变化过程，对整体人生至关重要，也在某种程度决定了人将来会过一种怎样的生活，电影的名字很长，其实的意思是向世界，正式的介绍自己，我，是玛格丽特。