Lady Bird is more than a time capsule. Writer-director Greta Gerwig plumbed her own Sacramento adolescence for a work of fiction that’s self-reflective but rarely precious. She renders the inextricable pain and joy of family, home and growing up in careful strokes. Gerwig’s proxy is Christine “Lady Bird” McPherson (Saoirse Ronan), a spunky senior at […]
While We’re Young
We all have to grow up eventually. There’s a grim air to that statement—it smacks of morbid cliché—but the inevitability of aging is a powerful motivator. It forces us to confront the decisions we’ve made thus far and confront our self-imposed stagnation. I don’t know if writer/director Noah Baumbach is a cynic but, like me, he is […]