Bottoms is a wild comedic take on high school

 


For many, high school can be tough. When you’re on the outside looking in it doesn’t feel like the best years of your life. When you’re on the bottom climbing your way up, anything that gives you a leg up can be a relief. That’s the backdrop for Bottoms, a new comedy from director Emma Seligman and star Rachel Sennott.

The two teamed before for Seligman’s feature film debut, Shiva Baby. Released in 2020, it was a comedy that pushed boundaries but made an impression. Now, they’re back doing the same with Bottoms, a film they co-wrote.

In the film, PJ (Sennott) and Josie (Ayo Edebiri) are longtime friends who are on the bottom of the social pyramid. They also spend their time pining for the popular cheerleaders Brittany (Kaia Gerber) and Isabel (Havana Rose Liu), who happens to be the girlfriend of the school’s star football player Jeff (Nicholas Galitzine).

The football players run the school, and when Josie and PJ try to stand up to Jeff, they have to scramble to ensure they aren’t booted out of school. After some quick thinking, they propose starting a fight club for the girls of the school. Along with friend Hazel (Ruby Cruz) and a faculty mentor (Marshawn Lynch), they get the club off the ground.

Josie and PJ spin some wild yarns, hoping to use the club to boost their social profile. While it creates new friendships, the truth of the girls’ motivations threatens to undo any of the gains they might make.

This is a wild tale. The fight club portion is incredible. Lynch’s teacher is hilarious. But it’s the final act of the film that just puts it over-the-top. The crisp writing, the directing and the story all help the wild elements come together and somehow work.

By the end of the film, you can’t help but root for PJ and Josie to succeed. The performances from Sennott and Edebiri are great and really help sell the story. It’s an exaggerated world that serves as a bit of fantasy for those that didn’t thrive in high school. These two performances help bring that world to life and sell the story.

Seligman does a nice job as the director, too. The pacing and visuals of the film work and the soundtrack is a lot of fun. The kinetic energy of the third act really draws you in and adds a great finish to the film. Her work here is strong, a great follow up to her work on Shiva Baby. I can’t wait to see what she does next.

Bottoms is a wild story and a heck of a ride. It’s a crisp 90 minutes, full of action and comedy. It’s led by two great performances and it’s well worth checking out as a gem to end the summer.

Bottoms is now playing nationwide.

Three and a half stars out of five


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