Bottoms
Director Emma Seligman follows up her 2020 debut success "Shiva Baby" by once again teaming up with lead actress Rachel Sennott (who also co-writes) for a truly unhinged take on the teen comedy, mostly following the familiar template but injecting a dose of the surreal to give everything a sheen of unpredictable chaos. Sennott and Ayo Edebiri (two 27-year-old actors playing high schoolers in what is certainly a gag in itself) play PJ and Josie, a pair of lesbian best friends who are not at all popular and are looking for ways to win over their crushes. PJ's crush is the tall, model-looking Brittany (Kaia Gerber, the daughter of Cindy Crawford) whereas Josie is after Isabel (Havana Rose Liu), the girlfriend of the school's hunky and moronic star quarterback Jeff (Nicholas Galitzine).
After a minor incident of violence with Jeff, rumors start to spread that PJ and Josie spent the summer in juvenile hall. Threatened with suspension, the two girls claim they were simply practicing for a non-existent feminist "self-defense club", which they then form in reality. Sponsored by teacher Mr. G (Marshawn Lynch), the small group grows into what is basically a female fight club that justifies their need for violence as a way to stand up to the dangerous threat posed by rival school Huntington High.
A lot of this will certainly sound like teen comedies you've seen before, but "Bottoms" is all about poking fun at the ridiculousness of the genre and exaggerating things to a ludicrous degree. The hot quarterback Jeff is so beloved by the football-obsessed school that he is literally carried everywhere he goes, having his every whim catered to by doting students and faculty alike. The school's top wrestler is kept in a cage in various classrooms, only allowed out to fight matches. Classes only last five minutes, because that's how long they always appear to be in the movies. There are a ton of background gags and jokes within the production design that make the world of the movie seem familiar but also completely absurd, providing a wonderfully unique sense of heightened unreality where anything could (and does) happen.
If anything, the movie doesn't work as well when it becomes briefly untethered from the silliness. PJ and Josie go through the whole routine of being best friends, getting pulled apart, getting in a big fight, and reconciling by the end. Those parts of their relationship are played very much by the teen comedy book, possibly in an effort to ground things at least a little bit, but it results in a pretty bland throughline with no particularly funny or unique subversions. There are a few very brief moments of recognition of the very real and serious threat of violence that women face, but those are quickly followed up by another bizarre happening or off-color joke.
Sennott and Edebiri are perfect as delightfully nerdy weirdos, making crass jokes and witty banter with a natural ease. Sennott (who was a revelation in "Shiva Baby") is absolutely a future megastar, with an ability to effectively sell both brash confidence and anxious sensitivity, often within the same scene. Edebiri is the more introverted of the pair and does well overcoming her character's bashfulness to earn her own moments of heroism by the end. The supporting cast is clearly having a great time, unexpectedly highlighted by Marshawn Lynch, the former NFL star running back, who has so many good lines as the super-chill teacher who sponsors the fight club while sporadically having various emotional revelations.
"Bottoms" is a comedy that is very much in on its own jokes, and while not many of them are of the laugh-out-loud variety, the chemistry of the cast and the gleeful sense of zaniness throughout are more than enough to make this a memorable effort. If 2023 marks the year when the comedy movie finally makes a comeback, "Bottoms" will be towards the top of the list of the movies that spearheaded their return.
