I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s tired of the saccharine sexlessness that so often pervades queer coming-of-age stories.
These tales are usually overly tame, heavily predicated on the plot of the protagonist’s coming out, and sanitized for straight audiences. (See: the running joke in the comedy series The Other Two, in which Cary can’t have sex with his method actor boyfriend, who’s starring in a chaste Love, Simon-esque high school drama.) This is doubly true when it comes to sapphic teen romances, which are even harder to come by and seem to operate on the assumption that girls are naturally angelic, abstinent creatures uninterested in doing much more than holding hands.
It’s not that these narratives don’t have their place. It’s just that they’re often all we see. Meanwhile, for decades, we’ve gotten a glut of raunchy sex comedies like Superbad, Porky’s, and American Pie, all revolving around straight male teens scheming to get their dicks wet. I’ve been waiting for the campy, horny queer romp we deserve for years. And with Bottoms, I’ve finally gotten it.
In director Emma Seligman’s madcap dark comedy, the follow-up to their acclaimed feature debut Shiva Baby, hapless lesbian losers Josie (Ayo Edebiri) and PJ (Rachel Sennott) pine hopelessly after their hot cheerleader crushes Isabel (Havana Rose Liu) and Brittany (Kaia Gerber) from afar. After accidentally starting a rumor that they went to juvie over the summer and grazing Isabel’s dopey manbaby quarterback boyfriend Jeff (Nicholas Galitzine) with a car, they attempt to save face and seduce the objects of their affection by starting a female self-defense club under the guise of feminism.Â
Before long, their ragtag crew grows closer via extracurricular brawling, and the two friends exploit the members’ traumatic pasts and fabricate increasingly gritty backstories in order to get laid. Josie and PJ soon find themselves tangled in a web of lies that becomes harder and harder to defuse.Â
Similar to the anxious, nail-biting cadence of Shiva Baby, the film rattles along at a breakneck pace, set to a tense soundtrack by Charli XCX and Leo Birenberg. (Side note: Keep an ear out for a perfectly timed Avril Lavigne needle drop sure to delight anyone who was an angsty teen in the early aughts.)
Edebiri, who displays her incredible naturalistic acting chops as Sydney on The Bear, is the ideal deadpan foil to Sennott’s Machiavellian loose cannon—the awkward Michael Cera to her randy Jonah Hill. She spirals into a monologue about a grim potential future as a closeted parent and mumbles and stammers her way through interactions with Isabel. Sennott, on the other hand, speaks in a smoker’s rasp, contorts her face into twisted expressions, and shows off a knack for physical comedy, including a cringe-inducing kiss scene.Â
Former Seattle Seahawks running back—and Portland restaurateur—Marshawn Lynch steals scene after scene as Mr. G, a boundaryless history teacher going through a divorce who agrees to act as the club’s advisor. The theater around me cheered when “Beast Mode” himself appeared onscreen. Apparently, Lynch signed on to the movie to support his lesbian sister, who came out in high school, and reportedly ad-libbed much of his dialogue. He gamely delivers lines like “The Holocaust: it happened” and “I know you ain’t tickling that pearl” with expert comedic timing. At one point, he had the audience in stitches with a rant about Amelia Earhart being a “fake hero” (“Many a guy flied planes without crashing them into the ocean!”).
Model-actress Havana Rose Liu is also hilarious as the cooing, doe-eyed ingenue Isabel. When she learns her jock boyfriend is cheating on her, she switches seamlessly from laughing in disbelief to sobbing hysterically. She lands absurd jokes with aplomb: When visiting Josie’s bedroom for the first time, she sees a painting of a Black Jesus and gushes, “I love God.” Moments later, she spies a hoodie and lights up as if it’s a rare treasure: “I always wanted one of these,” she says longingly, “but my mom said they hide your figure and make you look ugly.”
It’s a joy to see the ensemble going feral in their makeshift fight club. (The actors performed many of their stunts themselves.) A thread of primal bloodlust runs throughout the movie, underlining the current of sexual desire. Sound effects magnify every brutal punch and roundhouse kick, while streams of gore are highlighted in slo-mo.Â
The film gives all the standard teen tropes a dark, mordant twist, sharing the cynical ethos of movies like Sugar & Spice, Drop Dead Gorgeous, and Heathers (there’s even a gag about an aspiring high school terrorist). And of course, its surreal satire owes much to the queer classic But I’m a Cheerleader, which is referenced in the name of a restaurant where Josie and Isabel meet for a study date (But I’m a Diner).
Bottoms is a deliciously ribald entry into the “good for her” cinematic universe, which celebrates women making mischief and getting even. I hope it’s the bellwether of many more debauched queer films to come.
Bottoms is currently playing at Cinema 21, Laurelhurst Theater—and a good amount of Regals and Cinemarks.
