Booksmart Reviews

Since I kept hearing some pretty good things about this flick, I was quite eager to check it out. I remember it quite well, there was quite an outcry from the critics  because it turned out to be a box-office flop  when the critics thought it was actually a great movie. Well, to be honest, I’m not surprised that the damned thing didn’t make much waves when it was released. I mean, sure, it was a solid directorial debut from Olivia Wilde and it was fairly entertaining but it was also terribly generic. The fact that the movie was really similar to ‘Superbad’ and that Beanie Feldstein is actually Jonah Hill’s sister didn’t help to make this movie less derivative. Fortunately, the whole thing did start to take off when these two girls finally got to this party (that it took them so long to get there was also a rather poor narrative choice). Indeed, from this point on, not only the two main characters but also all the other characters started to get more complex and more interesting and, suddenly, nobody was completely mean or stupid and, suddenly, Amy and Molly were also not necessarily the 2 smartest persons in the room. Indeed, at this point, it became pretty obvious that they were not involved in social activities outside school not because they were ostracized but mostly because they thought they were better than the rest of their peers. This approach was definitely more complex and interesting than what you usually get to see in the other movies in this genre and it's too bad they went in this direction really late. Anyway, even though the movie itself not always really worked, I really had a weak spot for these 2 girls. Indeed, they were fully developed as characters, they felt really genuine and it was probably one of the greatest friendships I have ever seen displayed in a movie. Finally, there is no denying that Kaitlyn Dever and Beanie Feldstein both delivered some really good performances. Anyway, to conclude, in spite of its flaws, it was still a solid comedy and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.