Official movie posterIf ever there were a film to fit the Indie genre in in every single detail, The Exploding Girl is that film. From the off-putting title (no, she doesn’t actually explode) to the minimalist hair and makeup to the secondhand store clothes, Bradley Rust Grey’s coming of age story is every bit a a true to life account of a week in the life of a girl in college.
While on spring break, Ivy (Zoe Kazan) heads home where she deals with doctor’s appointments for her epilepsy and conflicting feelings for her non-committal boyfriend. And when her long-time friend Al (Mark Rendall) crashes with her and her mom, she must decide where her feelings for him fall–is he an older brother, a good friend or something more?
Kazan is riveting as the the shy college student. Her big grey-blue eyes dance around the screen as she watches her mom’s ballet students or dutifully listens to her doctor dole out advice about keeping her seizures under control. She is every bit a fresh-faced college student–she fidgets with her ring as she rides the subway, peeks coyly over the passenger seat as she talks to Al and adjusts her bra strap while waiting outside a friend’s apartment building. Even the way she dresses is endearing. Her hair nearly always in two mini-buns, she sports a quirky array of clothing: a green romper, a blue gingham dress and a rainbow sundress.
And the rest of the performances are just as seamless. At times, the on-screen action is so organic it’s difficult to remember that you’re sitting in a movie theatre and not sitting at the kitchen table as Al, Ivy and her mom play cards. What makes these performances so great, though, is the dialogue. The words spring so organically from each of the actors, it might as well be footage shot of a random pair on the streets of New York City. “Dude, that sucks,” Ivy remarks to Al upon learning his parents have rented out his room and he has no place to stay. Yes, there is a fair amount of “so, umm, like, ya,” but spend any amount of time around a 20-something girl and you’ll get the same experience.
But the dialogue is also where the film falters, more specifically, the speed of the dialogue. Far from the mile-a-minute banter of Gilmore Girls, scenes of Ivy talking to her boyfriend Greg on the phone stretch out through long, unnecessary silences, leaving the audience shifting in their seats, waiting for the awkwardness to be over.
Greg in and of himself is an interesting character, mostly because the audience never gets to meet Greg, but you get the sense he’s not a guy worth meeting. From Ivy’s initial conversation in car with Al, it becomes clear that Ivy and Greg’s relationship is tenuous at best. And when she calls him repeatedly, leaving one voicemail after another, you can’t help but want better for this doe-eyed college girl. To the audience, and to Ivy too, Greg is only a voice on the phone, and as she eagerly awaits his calls, her cellphone becomes an extension of her arm and serves as her only connection to her boyfriend.
But the film takes entirely too long to get to the predictable climax of the film about an hour into the 80 minutes, and the plot seems to crawl towards an inevitable ending, though even the ending is left intentionally ambiguous and unsatisfying. Despite it’s drawn-out style and the fact that the story is one of a handful of standardized young adult plot lines, the acting is fresh enough and the characters engaging enough to stick with the movie the whole way through.
The lackadaisical days of Ivy’s spring break are a nice change of pace, even if it does drag on. Everything just feels like spring from the warm and cheerful colors to the sunny lighting to the bright clothing to the trees in bloom. It’s definitely not your typical MTV spring break, but it is a relaxing one.
rachel grice 