Jay Elliot

"Girl" did an amazing job of capturing the emotions and experiences of gender dysphoria. As a trans man I cannot speak for trans women, but I did find the film relatable in many aspects. While I often would criticize the use of a cis male actor to play a trans woman, finding a transgender teen girl who was the right amount of androgynous for the character and could do ballet would be nearly impossible. I did find it a bit disturbing and unnecessary that the underage actor's genitals were shown despite this appearing to have no relevance. I felt the story emphasized the trans angst and "born in the wrong body" aspects with no regard for the positive emotions of transition. The ending was what really got me, while the extreme act of self-harm shown wasnt completely unforgivable in showing how much pain Lara's body caused her, the lack of apparent consequence or follow up was disappointing and dangerous. This act followed by a "look how much happier she is now after skipping an unknown amount of time!" scene was probably the worst way this couldve ended and ruined the whole movie for me. The one aspect I found very responsibly portrayed was tucking (attempting to hide or reduce the appearance of genitals or a "bulge"), it was made very clear both why Lara chose the dangerous methods she did (an unfortunately common experience for trans teens), and the negative impact was emphasized appropriately.

I loved this movie, a lot of it had me on the edge of my seat. The characters were well portrayed, the suspension was intense, and the plot wrapped up well in a lot of ways near the end (other than the obvious setup for a sequel, that was a little annoying). However the plot was a bit cliche, despite being well executed, and a lot of the attempts at surprising viewers (such as the crush room scene) were actually quite predictable. The movie had it's flaws but overall I'm still very glad I saw it and I'll definitely watch the sequel if they make one. 4/5