Laggies

Laggies is all about growing up, with its main character unable to take life seriously. The film explores to several compelling points of moving on to adulthood. Then it takes to a quirkier turn where Megan tries to make another life with a younger crowd where she feels more accepted of who she is. This is meant to be a story about getting away from the comfort zone, the movie does bring a lot of acknowledgment of why this is supposed to be the right thing, but it resolves to a more comfortable type of ending which doesn't live up much to what it wants to say. Thankfully, most of it is undeniably delightful and clever, delivered by charming talents on screen. This isn't probably what Laggies is meant to be, but there is still a lot of reasons why you should like it, anyway.

The film started out in a compellingly tough state for the main character; having less fun with her old high school friends and dealing with other complicated issues. She's basically avoiding from those personal troubles of how life has changed and finding a way to completely run away from them. Once she meets her new set of younger friends, it leads to a build up of a much different purpose. The story carries Megan with heavy questions, but the movie doesn't seem to have the guts of being challenging, thus results to an easier solution with her problems. This is probably not a bad thing, but it could have gone a little deeper. But the sweetness didn't rob much of the value. The film's own charming world alone at least makes things memorable.

What totally benefits here is the cast. Keira Knightley just perfectly captures her character's teen-like personality without making it look inappropriately weird. Sam Rockwell's magnetic charisma just brings a lot of likable impact at every scene he is in. Chloë Grace Moretz does her usual thing and there's definitely nothing wrong with that. These talents just makes it work. The movie already handles its own humor cleverly without making each of them feel forced, unlike most comedies out there. Maybe letting these stars come around and talk into each other already makes for a worth of watch.

Laggies kind of drops its "growing up" intentions and instead tells something about being happy about your own decisions, or something like that. The message it brings in the end is definitely not the one that it once tried to show, maybe because the film decided that they wanted to go conventional to that point. And the movie seems to be alright with that, which is sort of a strange aspect. But the best way to see the movie is just letting the talents bring it to life in their small lighter moments, it's a far more entertaining movie if that's the focus. There are still things that could have made it much engaging, but there's already a good movie in here that would instantly appeal the audience.

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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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!

A woman who is approaching her thirties and still doesn't know what she wants from life (like most of us, I would say), accidentally meets a teenager and uses her to escape responsibility, at least for a short time. A romantic comedy elevated from mediocrity by a rather realistic depiction of the mental state that most of us go through at some point in our lives. Some go through it maturely and responsibly, even painlessly, but many bring themselves into tragicomic situations as the heroine of this film. Partly because I found myself in this story to some extent, and partly because of Keira Knightley and Chloë Grace Moretz, I have to rate it at least a little higher than it objectively deserves.

7/10

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.