Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret is a movie miracle. Here's why.
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There's a general impression that art made for pre-teens and teenagers is easy. Like somehow it's really easy to connect with young people at their level without feeling like blatant pandering or sanding down life's rough edges. Here's what I'll say. That, generally speaking, the scrutiny that children's entertainers receive is historically, lower than their folks aiming at adults. But, the ones that rise to the top or stick around for generations? There's usually a reason. And that reason is quality. Whether it's pure craft, skill or just a gut-level of "getting it," a lot of great children's entertainers are genuinely great artists often pulling off a high-wire act.
That's a big reason why Judy Blume and her novels were such a big deal. She spoke to kids real life experiences like she was one of them. Validated their feelings of insecurity and discomfort as they tried to figure out the world. And more often than not gave them hope that things will turn out ok.
Now adapting Blume's books into a movie? Easier said than done. Because how do you piece together a film, meant for children and adults alike, that tackles religion, puberty, social anxiety and complicated family dynamics. Well like this because Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret is a minor movie miracle.
The Setup
Based on the Judy Blume novel of the same name, the film follows the titular 11-year old Margaret Simon who comes home from camp to an unwelcome surprise. Her family is leaving New York and moving to the New Jersey suburbs. Now feeling isolated from her friends and family and trying to forge new connections, Margaret begins dealing with big questions by talking to God as the hardest year in her young life takes hold.
There's so much I love about this movie. The acting is phenomenal from top to bottom (we'll come back to this), it's captures its era so well in look and music (great production design), and it's very well directed by Kelly Fremon Craig. But the real miracle here is the script, which was also written by our director Craig. Right out of the gate, the script makes a number of solid choices.
The first is setting the novel in 1970. If there's one thing you don't want to do, it's try and update setting of Blume's novels written in the seventies to the present day. We'd have to deal with smart phones and potentially online bullying and a lot of the charm of Blume's work would get lost in the process. So by keeping it in it's era, you both make it feel like a timeless coming-of-age story and avoid any adaptation clunkers.
The second is a slight shift in perspective. Because while this is very much Margaret's story first and foremost, this is also her mother's Barbara's story. What I find so clever is that Margaret's story and experienced is conveyed very directly, we see what happens and then we hear or see Margaret react or try to process. Whereas Barbara's experience is conveyed through showing not telling.
Which means kids will kinda experience Barbara like they might watching their own parent deal with a difficult situation, they may not reveal everything, but it also means that Barbara isn't a villain. We can see she's on a parallel track to Margaret in terms of trying to settle into a new place and figure things out and be a good mom, but also not 100% sure of what to do.
And this is where maybe one of the most underrated acting performances of the last five years comes in.
And this is where maybe one of the most underrated acting performances of the last five years comes in.
Because holy hell Rachel McAdams.
The rest of the cast is great (i.e. it always improves your movie to add Kathy Bates to the cast) but this movie leans so heavily on McAdams for the lion's share of emotional heavy lifting...while also not communicating the emotions through dialogue 90 percent of the time.
I'll give you a small example. At one point, Barbara is addressing a stack of cards. Then she stops and we see her look up an address. And then between the shot selection and McAdams face, we have to get the inner conflict Barbara is feeling sending this particular card to these particular people. There is no dialogue or voice over to convey her emotions in this moment. It is all through acting and directing. And it works.
That's an easy scene. Cut to about 15 minutes later and now she has to convey discomfort while putting on a nice face for someone she would never want to speak to otherwise. Or later on when she's doing her best to put on a brave face for her daughter but kinda failing.
Conceptually, there's no reason for her to give this level of performance for this movie, but she didn't phone a single minute in.
Conceptually, there's no reason for her to give this level of performance for this movie, but she didn't phone a single minute in.
Oh right and I'm not even done with what impressed me the most about the script: the high wire act.
The nice thing about writing a book about a young girl about to hit puberty is that you don't have to write dialogue or pick visuals. At least not when your main character is giving highlights from her life and is more or less cherry picking stuff. Now try to imagine dialogue and visuals that will still feel right and appropriate for most ages for the following:
- Young girls having their period for the first time.
- Young girls finding out what human anatomy looks like for the first time.
- A young male black teacher that feels appropriately supportive
- Discussing Christianity and Judaism
- Discussing why you don't talk to certain grandparents anymore
And now try to make it feel genuine and grounded. What a mine field of a time and Kelly Fremon Craig somehow pulled it off. Regardless of the solid source material, this was not easy to do and as I alluded to early, the fact that they did is a movie miracle.
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