Stargirl Review

March 15, 2020 at 4:55pm
By Jason Stettner

This is a really light hearted romantic film about a boy finding the manic pixie dream girl he’s always needed. In an ultra American town about football and one school where nothing happens, this strange colorful girl somehow brings them to greatness. She’s quirky, got quite a tune and really likes this random boy named Leo (Graham Verchere).

There’s a very awkward sort of connection between the two, as he starts to get close to Stargirl (Grace VanderWaal). It works well, and it’s actually a delight to see. This is mostly just an upbeat, happy sort of romance film and then it goes flying off the rails towards the latter part of the movie. You have to really scavenge around to find the message as that became muddled and then perhaps entirely thrown away towards the end.

It was almost terrible how this one ended as it was abrupt, and not distinct despite trying to be hitting some level of a profound conclusion. I still mostly enjoyed watching this, there was something charming to it but it just trailed off which was disappointing. It could have just been a nice feel good sort of film, though I’m unlikely to dive into this quirky little adventure again.

VanderWaal really carries this movie, seriously. She’s just fantastic, and steals the show with some lovely musical moments. I could see her having a lot of potential in the future in other performances. I found the lead Leo to be a bit bland, and sort of just the entry point into the story that’s going on.

It’s less about him, and the events here really didn’t seem to alter him all that much. Looking at his perspective, it must have been one puzzling and random part of his life that honestly makes little sense by the end of it. This was fairly well shot, nothing too special yet great stand-out moments during the band sequences.

It was a bit too American for me in terms of the small town setting and what the entire background focus was for everyone involved. I get what they were going for in adding so many hopeful aspects, but many of the issues felt manufactured as did the premise behind the apparently worthless school they went to that could accomplish no accolades without a strange girl swapping it up.

The Conclusion

Stargirl provides a very happy atmosphere, with a strong performance from the title character though it does trail off considerably. The message it was trying to convey really did get muddled, which is disappointing as it seemed to be building towards something interesting and ultimately fell short.

Again, VanderWaal was fantastic here and I hadn’t anticipated that prior to viewing this. Ultimately, this feels rather generic despite having a strong kick off. It did have a number of charming moments, and it does deal with loss in some healthy ways. Other parts of that statement didn’t really hit the mark being an awkward source of conflict for another.

It’s definitely a weird sort of movie, but not one that I’ll likely recall in the future. It was a charming time, at least for a short while. I had a constant feeling of some grim twist, instead it was a weird decay into what was an empty ending.

Stargirl Review at Home with Streamed Viewing

Rating Overall: 5.4