Juliana

I have been a fan of Melanie for years, but honestly this movie was very disappointing. It was hard for me to follow the plot and I felt like some scenes (like Show & Tell) were completely useless and didn’t contribute to the plot at all. The acting was at best subpar, and many of the lines ended up being repetitive (A good portion of the movie was just Melanie & her friends talking about being late to class). I feel like there were too many subplots that didn’t have to do with the story or weren’t expanded upon enough to make sense, such as the scene where an African American student gets in trouble for not standing during the pledge of allegiance. I can understand that Melanie was trying to portray the oppressive nature of the school as well as to make a political statement, but I feel like that incident just fell flat because it wasn’t ever mentioned again or expanded upon. This happens many times throughout the film with different social issues (trans rights, women’s healthcare, etc). However, the cinematography was gorgeous, as well as the costumes, set design, and overall aesthetics of the film. I believe it could have had so much potential if Melanie kept to making music videos or didn’t put the songs it the film, because the random transitions into the music took away so much from the film. Melanie is a very good director, and even though this is her first film, the movie could have been so much better.