Greta Gerwig's Lady Bird is one of my favorite movies in recent memory. Most things about it are perfect, from the pacing to the character development to the soundtrack. And on top of everything, it is on the front lines of the Rom Com Resistance. As romance comes in and out of Christine's life, you feel her excitement, and you feel the intimacy of these relationships, but Gerwig makes it abundantly clear that they are just one part of Christine's life. Her friendships, hobbies, dreams for her future, and relationships with family members balance out the plot, with its central focus, of course, on her relationship with her mother.
Lady Bird resists rom com tropes without being too in-your-face about how subversive it is, and without generating a media frenzy about it either. It is simply an excellent movie. Saoirse Ronan's performance as an expressive, audacious teen anchors the film, and I don't really know what directors do, but I'm sure Greta Gerwig played a pretty big role in making this movie as delightful and near-perfect as it is. That said, I was thrilled to hear that Ronan and Gerwig would be collaborating again, and when I saw the trailer for Little Women, I was even more excited.
The trailer made it seem like Gerwig, Ronan, and Co. would be blessing us with a bold and lively spinster manifesto. Or that was how I interpreted it, because I look for the spinster manifesto in everything. (You can find one anywhere if you believe in yourself.) In the trailer, Jo passionately articulates the value of women outside of romantic love, and she is trying to assert this notion through her writing as well, as we see when she negotiates with her publisher. The trailer's final shot, clearly meant as a gag to make us laugh, shows the publisher asking Jo when her protagonist is getting married. He sees marriage as a given for all women, and she is simply not interested in writing her novel that way. Impatiently, she looks away, implying that this is a ridiculous question. Of course her protagonist is not getting married. She has been very clear about this.
