EIGHTH GRADE

Director: Bo Burnham

92, R

Screenwriter: Bo Burnham

Cast: Elsie Fisher, Josh Hamilton, Emily Robinson, Jake Ryan.

 

There are few transitions that throw you for a loop more than the abyss between eighth grade and high school. What is astonishing is the eerie insight of first time writer/director Bo Burnham that had me asking “Wait a minute – were you there?” High praise also goes to newbie Elsie Fisher, who captures the torture of that entré into teendom with sensitivity, humor, weirdness, and enough spunk that you feel she’ll end up OK, if not entirely unscathed. Fisher, as Kayla, navigates her final week of middle school – uploading upbeat advice to her YouTube channel, trying to be invisible at pool parties, and falling back on the support of her kind, clueless Dad (Josh Hamilton.) A hit at The Sundance Film Festival that reminds us what independent filmmaking can do, that Hollywood can’t.
“A beautiful and uncompromising piece of art, from a distinctive new talent.” – Peter Hartlaub, San Francisco Chronicle.
94 min. www.a24films.com/films/eighth-grade