Laggies

Laggies would have been too big a mirror put up to my twenty-something crises-ed life were it not for the comedic value of the whole she-bang.

That's mildly dramatic but really Laggies is a very original take on the quarter-life crises beseeching the Millennial generation.

Megan (Keira Knightley) is an underachieving twenty-something resigned to an underwhelming existence of still dating her high school boyfriend and working for her father. Her friends are all doing the things you're supposed to be doing when you are in your mid-to-late twenties: getting married, having babies, buying a house, etcetera etctera. With a quarter-life crisis imminently on the horizon, Megan retreats to the home of new found friend Annika (Chloe Grace Moretz), a sixteen year old high school student.

The term Laggies comes from Megan's profoundly underwhelming inferior performance in life below her potential. She is in this debilitatingly immobilizing limbo of the mid-twenties when, having done what you thought you were supposed to do and following the path you thought you were supposed to follow, you find yourself 'here' but 'here' isn't where you want to be. Andrea Seigel's screenplay does a good job of satirically making fun of the trends Milennials are doing nowadays as they 'play' house – like first dances and potential baby names.

A good movie will have characters and themes you can identify with, that will help put a mirror to life and help you engage with the narrative. For some 20-somethings most of the film and Keira Knightley's portrayal of an existential crisis may be a bit too close for comfort. Thankfully Chloe Grace Moretz's character has a dad played by Sam Rockwell. Rockwell is the shining light of a comic savior within the film and lifts up the depressing moments of story to a entertainingly watchable movie.

Laggies is a fun one-time watch for 20-somethings to realize they could be more messed up and to find the humor within the perplexities of burgeoning adulthood.

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Laggies is a "coming of age" romantic comedy with a twist as the main character is not an adolescent, but is 28 years old. The film is not exceptional, but it is enjoyable, and its performances and story progression help to elevate an average film overall. Laggies begins by telling the story of Megan (played by Keira Knightley) whose longtime boyfriend (played by Mark Webber) has just proposed to her. Megan, having also just found out her father (played by Jeff Garlin) is having an extramarital affair, experiences a bit of an identity crisis, and doesn't know quite how to respond to her own marriage proposal. She plans a fake trip, in order to escape from her boyfriend for a week, and finds herself in the house of her newly found, 16 year old girlfriend, Annika (played by Chloe Grace Moretz), and her single, stern father, Craig, (played by Sam Rockwell).

The main characters go through changes as they begin to know each other. Megan starts out as a manipulative lying person who uses people, but as the film continues, she realizes this is not what she wants and begins to take charge of her own life by becoming more responsible. The character of Annika goes from being a risky teenager to becoming more of her own person, even confronting her own mother. Her father, Craig, goes through a character progression as he becomes less stuck-up and more of a person who actually cares for other people. All of three of the main characters story arcs nicely parallel each other. Out of all of the character arcs, I found Megan's due to Keira Knightley's performance, to be the most believable.

However, I did have my issues with this film. I found the boyfriend of the film, Anthony, to be a bit of a push-over and too much of a plot device. He gets introduced, gets a few scenes and then reappears during the climax. Another thing that bugged about the film, was an absurd scene where Knightley has to pose as Moretz's mother and I couldn't honestly believe that anyone would honestly believe that Knightley and Moretz were mother and daughter, what with the twelve years difference, and looking more like sisters.

There are some interesting directing choices by Lynn Shelton, including having the film start out with a flashback and then cutting to ten years later. As well as Knightley's introduction, where we see her listening to a CD player on the streets as she holds up a sign advertising her father's accounting business where she works. Check it out for yourself, and see what you think of it.

Ever feel like you have spent far too much of your life wandering around and trying to please everyone else?

I would say that after my last Keira Knightly adventure with Mark Ruffalo and now this movie, I am just about ready to have her as my friend. It was so hard to like her after all that fawning over her looks in other movies. She is really a charming actress and made my day with this performance. Apparently she replaced Anne Hathaway at the last minute. It is hard to imagine Ms. Hathaway in the role because Keira Knightly owns it so completely. I usually find the performances of Brits who play Americans strangely flat, but Ms. Knightly is one good exception to the rule. She falls into her role and seems to use her outsider status as an asset which works within the premise of the movie.

Sam Rockwell is incredible. What is it about that man? He has a very sexy brain. If he were one tiny bit better looking his seductive capacity would be less mesmerizing, so thank heaven for small favors.

Have fun!

Just what does it mean to really 'grow up'? As kids, many of us no doubt assumed that maturity and independence would naturally follow once we hit a certain age. But, as most of us have since discovered, that isn't necessarily true: people can easily be adults in age but children in attitude. Laggies, an affable film with quirky indie sensibilities and a great cast, explores these issues with quite a lot of charm and genuine humour, although its odd plotting fails to live up to its characters in the end.

Megan (Keira Knightley) is stuck. Ten years after graduating from high school, her friends have all moved on with their lives and accumulated the accoutrements of adulthood: jobs, husbands, babies. Only Megan remains stalled in permanent adolescence, temping for her dad and living with her doting high-school boyfriend Anthony (Mark Webber). When Anthony's proposal of marriage forces her to contemplate leaving her commitment-free comfort zone, Megan takes refuge in the home of Annika (Chloe Moretz), a high-school girl who begs Megan for help in buying alcohol. In the course of a week, Megan discovers that there's more to life than idling in first gear, and draws closer to Annika and her dad, lawyer Craig (Sam Rockwell).

There's actually quite a lot to enjoy in Laggies, even if its ending is a foregone conclusion. Andrea Seigel's screenplay is sharp and smart, developing her characters into something more than stereotypes. There's a gentle, deep undertow of understanding in Megan's budding friendship with Annika - one which brings them both to a bittersweet meeting with Bethany (Gretchen Mol), the mom who abandoned Annika for a new career as a lingerie model. As played tenderly by Knightley and Rockwell, the way in which Megan is drawn towards Craig also makes sense, even if their connection feels a little forced.

The performances are also top-notch. Knightley delivers one of her most fascinating creations yet: a woman who has drifted through rather than lived her life for years, not daring to sever ties to her past but afraid to forge into the future. Her Megan is spiky and sweet, appealing even when the character's flaws threaten to overwhelm. Rockwell's part is a bit undercooked, but he's such a great actor that he lends Craig's attraction to Megan all the credibility denied it by the script. Moretz, too, is great as always, slipping into the troubled skin of Annika and creating another lost girl with plenty of spunk.

Where Laggies falters is in its final act. The last third of the film has a few great moments, including a heartrending encounter between Megan and Anthony that shouldn't work as well as it does. But it also degenerates steadily into cliché, abandoning much of its offbeat humour and complex characters for twists both odd (Megan's reaction to a car accident begs the question: is that really how a grown-up should respond to the situation?) and predictable (Megan's epiphany is a textbook rom-com moment).

In effect, Laggies stops growing, just as Megan did for ten years of her life. At the end, it provides easy answers for its characters after spending most of its running time suggesting that there are no such things: that the real world is complicated and people aren't perfect, that growing up takes effort and doesn't happen by default. This doesn't mean that the film isn't watchable - it very much is, and will reward viewers with some truly lovely moments of wry humour and quirky characterisation along the way. But its undeniable charm is also what makes Laggies' ending all the more disappointing.

This film tells the story of a woman who escapes from her life and finds companionship with a teenage girl, after her boyfriend proposes to her during her best friend's wedding.

"Laggies" shows Megan as a person who runs from the things she want in her life. She strikes up an unlikely friendship with a teenage girl, and they both help each other grow. Another subplot is a romantic comedy subplot between Megan and the lonely lawyer, which I think is more engaging than the main plot. Sam Rockwell is charming as a lonely lawyer, and he is a good match with Keira Knightley in this film. I would have liked to see more of this subplot, and I would not even mind if the story is changed to a romantic comedy between these two!