Greta Gerwig became the fifth woman to be nominated for the Oscar for Best Director with the movie Lady Bird – Time to Fly. The film tells the story of Christine, played by Saoirse Ronan, who also achieved the nomination as best actress in 2018.
Christine is a teenager trying to find herself in the adult world. The character, as well as the feature, has all the style of the film independent of the festival of Sundance. She is strong, stubborn, funny and eccentric. Their actions are sudden and difficult to predict. For example, she wants everyone to refer to her by the name of Lady Bird, the name she gave herself, in order to assert herself in the adult world with her own decisions. This also rejoices her, since it goes against what her mother wants.
Christine, or Lady Bird, does everything possible to get away from Marion McPherson, her mother-in-law and played by Academy Award-nominated Laurie Metcalfe in the best supporting actress category. It is not only in her words or behavior that the girl indirectly protests her mother’s actions. She even throws herself from a car at high speed suddenly, startling the mother who was driving and who, until then, did not stop talking.
If Lady Bird wants to be free from the rules of a conservative family, schoolmates could be the tool to achieve that goal. But even these are surrounded by secrets and mysteries that do not make the girl’s life easy.
The school that attends is a Catholic school and students are expected to conform to rules of conduct as well as dress code. Thus, some of these students, who do not necessarily succeed in adjusting to school, end up pretending to be something they are not and consequently making the complex life of a teenager even more complicated.
On top of all this, Lady Bird shows her affection for art, even when she does not seem to have talent. The taste for art is also confused by the search for a love. So Lady Bird wants to win a singing competition to get into a play and get closer to her passion, Danny O’Neill (Lucas Hedges). However, the boy tries to match the feelings of Lady Bird since he wants to hide the fact of being a homosexual.
This hurts the girl, who finds in Kyle Scheible (Timothée Chalamet) the antidote for her pains. However, even this one hurts her since she pretends to be a virgin to “lose her virginity” with her. And who is the person who comforts her when this happens? Your mother.
It is exactly this conflict in relation to a controlling mother, but that always offers its aid in the sad moments of the protagonist, that the film explores effectively. In order to let the scenes unfold longer than traditional productions, Greta Gerwig manages to bring a contemplative look to the pains of her protagonist (who, according to the director herself, is inspired by her own life).
(This article original language is portuguese. This translation was made with Google Translate)