The Diary of a Teenage Girl

Marielle Heller's directorial debut The Diary of a Teenage Girl really packs a punch as a confronting film about sexuality, intimacy and coming of age. What sets this film apart from other films in this genre is that it is told through the lens of a teenage girl, and while this is a refreshing approach, it does heighten the tension and make the movie more real.

Minnie Goetze (Bel Powley) lives in 1970s San Francisco with her mother Charlotte (Kristen Wiig) and younger sister Gretel (Abby Wait). She is attracted to her mother's boyfriend Monroe (Alexander Skårsgard) and soon begins an affair with him, losing her virginity at the same time. Minnie soon begins an journey of exploring her sexuality joined by her friend Kimmie (Madeline Waters), but at the same time is under the watchful eye of her concerned stepfather Pascal (Christopher Meloni).

What caught me instantly about this movie was its tone. I had initially thought it was going to be a light comedy, and it is pretty funny in places, turned out to be a rather serious drama. And this is definitely a welcome fact. If this movie had been funny the whole way through, I think it would definitely trivialise the subject matter and say "Hey, girls can't be sexual beings." By taking it all seriously, Minnie's journey to adulthood is legitimised. The film's exploration of intimacy and feminism is greatly aided by the characters around Minnie, especially her mother Charlotte and Monroe. The exploration of drug experimentation also feels genuine and a little more scary than that idea of peace loving hippies you associate with experimentation around this time.

Although you could transplant this story into any decade since the 60s and still have it be effective, the choice to set it in the 70s was a good one, especially when you add the San Francisco setting into the mix. The muted colour palatte of the film really lends to that familiar look of the film and the soundtrack really cements this feeling. All the costumes also give the film a great authenticity. The film's editing and camera choices also stick out as technical elements that really help convey some of the subtle emotion of the film.

For someone with such limited screen experience, Bel Powley is a real talent to carry such an emotionally heavy role. Her portrayal of Minnie is authentic and memorable and she really gets into the skin of this heavily conflicted character. Compared to her performance, everyone else seems like they are just playing support roles. Alexander Skårsgard does such an amazing job playing the broken character of Monroe, torn between his love of Minnie and Charlotte. I felt like Kristen Wiig could have been better in this movie, as she definitely has the capacity to play serious roles quite well. I was disappointed that Christopher Meloni didn't have as much screentime as he should, because his performance of psychoanalist Pascal was amazingly intense and he shares a hilarious non-verbal scene with Alexander Skårsgard that had me in stitches. Both Abby Wait and Madeline Waters do fantastic jobs in their first feature roles.

While The Diary of a Teenage Girl may be confronting for a number of reasons, its rawness is really refreshing in a world of movies that are all about perfect people doing perfect things.