Based upon the novel by Judy Blume
Produced by James L. Brooks
Written For The Screen and Directed by Kelly Fremon Craig
RATED PG 13
***1/2 (three and a half stars)
By the time I read Judy Blume's seminal Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret, I had already devoured Blume's Tales Of A Fourth Grade Nothing and it's sequel/spin off Otherwise Known As Sheila The Great multiple times. In doing so, I completely embraced Judy Blume as one of my first heroes. While Judy Blume possessed an inexplicable gift of insight and empathy into the inner world of children, she also clearly enhanced my life as her books inspired a love of reading, stories and storytelling and in my future, my love of writing. In short, I would have read anything if she had written it.
Yet, Margaret was different.
For some context, when I was introduced to the literary world of Judy Blume, I was eight years old. I entered the 3rd grade in an new school and I was then forced to gradually finding my footing in a classroom of highly sophisticated kids who visibly possessed tight bonds with each other due to the longevity of their time together as classmates since nursery school as well as living together within the Hyde Park/University Of Chicago campus community and neighborhoods--an area where I did not live and had previously been foreign to me.
While George Lucas' "Star Wars" (1977)--then, only in the world for a few life changing months--provided me with a way in, the just as seismic lightning strike of Judy Blume (as delivered by a classroom visit by a school librarian) afforded me somewhat of an anchor in this brand new setting as my love of her books allowed me to slowly begin to establish an identity with my new classmates. I read her books constantly. And each time I was able to obtain a new title, as with Iggie's House and the dark, gut punch of Blubber plus the aforementioned titles, I became more and more devoted to Judy Blume as if she was the kind voice in my ear entertaining me with stories but even greater, assuring me that I was going to be ok and somehow understood my feelings, as confused and conflicted as they were.
But again, Margaret was different.
While of course, the book was not lacking in Blume's trademark wit, honesty, and empathy, for the first time, there was something that felt to be a little out of reach for me. I was gently chided once by some of the boys in my classroom as I read intensely ("That's a girl's book," they said. "It's not a 'girl's' book," I retorted. "It's a good book!" Nothing else was said to me afterwards about it.) but, my classmates quickly realized that Judy Blume and I were inseparable. And still, with Margaret, I wasn't connecting as I previously had with Blume's stories. Frankly, I just didn't get it.
As an adult, I look back and realize that, just as simply, I wasn't ready for it. It wasn't time. And quite possibly, perhaps that book was not necessarily written for me.
As Judy Blume's Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret is a story partially about a girl on the edge of reaching puberty, it is ultimately a deeply perceptive and unapologetically female take about finding one's place in the world, and decidedly without the imaginary male audience reading it. This was Blume speaking directly to every girl who chose to read and through that level of deep communication and understanding, the book clearly reached its intended audience with a passion and devotion that has lasted over 50 years, while dumbfoundedly also being the center of book censorship for the same amount of time.
Clearly, Blume herself knew that there was something different about this book compared to her other works as she resisted selling the rights for any film adaptations for over 40 years since the book's publications before ultimately selling to Producer James L. Brooks and Writer/Director Kelly Fremon Craig, who herself had previously made the outstanding "The Edge Of Seventeen" (2016). Well, Judy Blume and her generations of fans can not only breathe easily, they, and all of us, can rejoice as Craig's film adaptation is a winner, one that fully honors the beloved source material as well as emerging as a sublime and graceful work of cinematic storytelling in its own right.
As with the novel, Kelly Fremon Craig's "Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret" is set in 1970 and chronicles a year in the life of 11 year old Margaret Simon (richly played by Abby Ryder Forston), whose life is upended upon her return from summer camp as her parents Barbara and Herb (played by Rachel McAdams and Benny Safdie) have decided to move from their New York City apartment to the suburbs of New Jersey in the face of Herb's recent job promotion.
In addition to suddenly having to leave behind all she knows and loves, including an especially powerful friendship with her eccentric Grandmother Sylvia (Kathy Bates), Margaret's new life finds her on the cusp of puberty, a profoundly and simultaneously private and universal experience, as shared between herself and a new clique of friends led by know-it-all Nancy Wheeler (a perfectly cast Elle Graham) who hilariously guides the group through her now iconic chest growing chants while competitively taunting about who will receive their period first, thus triggering Margaret's anxiety about the natural progression of her growth and development.
On top of that, plus a budding crush upon neighbor/classmate Moose Freed (Aidan Wojtak-Hissong), and enduring hormone fueled class parties with her new classmates, Margaret begins to navigate precisely what her place in the world actually is and can be, which incudes the world of religion. While she speaks and prays to God as a means of conveying her worries and fears to someone, anyone who just might understand, Margaret Simon, has been raised without religion due to the familial prejudices faced by her parents' interfaith marriage, as Dad is Jewish and Mom is Christian, and therefore, Margaret feels untethered at her core.
Meanwhile, Barbara, a former Art teacher, is struggling to find her own footing in her new life in New Jersey while Sylvie, struggling with loneliness, also attempts to discover where this next life chapter may take her, thus making the film an intergenerational coming of age story of three women all attempting to define life for themselves, each upon their own terms.
Dear readers, in a pivotal time of movie going where the franchises have fully taken over, especially in the wake of the rise of streaming platforms and the decimation of movie theaters during the Covid-19 pandemic, it is a miracle that Kelly Fremon Craig's "Are You There God? It's Me Margaret" was even made let alone received a full, theatrical release. Moves like this one not only are deserving of our support just due to the kind of film that it is. It is deserving of our support and embrace because it is an exceedingly strong, warm, genuine, delightful and wisely honest film that is enormously breezy in its entertainment and "slice-of-life" presentation but also possesses a depth of existential pathos that is true to the life experience and our roles within that experience.
Kelly Fremon Craig has succulently created a film that works as a perfect bookend to "The Edge Of Seventeen" as well as serving as a terrific companion piece to Writer/Director Bo Burnham's masterful "Eighth Grade" (2018) as well as Director Domee Shi's "Turning Red" (2022) for Pixar. While "Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret" smartly keeps the narrative staged in 1970, Craig deftly weaves the nostalgia of her film with the contemporary eras of the three aforementioned films into a timeless narrative, which then creates a conversation with everyone in the audience. Much like the events and trajectory of the characters within the 12 year odyssey of Writer/ Director Richard Linklater's beautiful "Boyhood" (2012), this specific stage of Margaret's life will undoubtedly reflect the exact same section of the girls in the audience, while adult women will remember.
Kelly Fremon Craig not only and brilliantly keeps the emotional honesty of Blume's novel wholly intact but also the biological honesty, which itself serves the characters, and only continues to make the controversy surrounding this story inexcusable as this stage of life is being experienced or has been experienced by over half of the world's population for all of human history. This particular element of societal shame remains intact in the narrative as the mystery and primal embarrassment surrounding the human female body and the natural bodily process and metamorphosis is reflected in many sequences between Margaret and her friends, both humorously and painfully, playing out through moments of peer pressure, public humiliation and even Margaret's misguided cruelty towards another classmate who is taller, bustier and more outwardly "womanly" than her peers.
As Margaret Simon, Abby Ryder Forster is superbly engaging through her matter of fact presence which is as natural as if we were just watching this real actress live her real daily life away from the cameras. She never once strikes a false note, and to that end, neither does Craig who directs the film with a sure, clean creative hand, always knowing the inherent drama within Blume's original story is enough just as it is. Nether she nor Forster needlessly jazz up the proceedings with histrionics and prefabricated emotions and contrivances. They allow Judy Blume's story to exist and breathe on its own terms and they inhabit it wonderfully, with patience and tenderness.
As much as this story focuses upon Margaret's emerging menstruation, Kelly Fremon Craig's handling of Margaret's relationship with religion is also quietly daring, especially within a genre that often wishes to proselytize and weigh in on the side of simply having a strict belief and adherence to faith. Judy Blume's novel and now Craig's film are thankfully and crucially much wiser than that, knowing all too well that one's relationship with religion and spirituality is not that simple, especially, in this case for Margret as her relationship is forged through religious bigotry and a parental rejection of all religions until Margaret makes a decision for herself when she becomes as adult.
Here is where, Craig widens her scope as the film could have easily centered upon Margaret, leaving all of the other characters upon the sidelines. "Are You There God? Its Me, Margaret," is also the story of a marriage and parenthood, with still young parents attempting to make their way in this new era of the 1970s by refusing to make the same closed minded mistakes made upon them by their own parents. Even so, and as well intentioned as they are, both Herb and Barbara are not infallible and their own closed minded decision to raise Margaret without any sense of religious awareness could be viewed as a mistake in and of itself. In doing so, Margaret is indeed left to her own devices, and bravely goes it alone to figure religion out for herself and is ultimately criticized by her parents when she does.
As for her prayers, well...with no real foundation or context as to what the concept of God could be, it does bring to question just exactly who does Margaret feel that she is speaking to in her private moments? Is it a deity or is it herself? Both? Neither? Regardless, it is through Margaret's sense of aloneness that she turns inward and outward, trying to see if anything fits, trying to determine just what is exactly her place in the world and the universe.
And Kelly Fremon Craig's scope widens even further...
While Margaret is appropriately center stage throughout, I loved how Kelly Fremon gave equal conceptual weight to both Barbara and Sylvia. Rachael McAdams give a performance of such ease and grace as she is having a stretch of time that is as equally awkward and as painful as her daughter. Yet, instead of Margaret who is facing so much of the unknown, Barbara, is confronting her own sense of self based upon who she was, the events that shaped her and does any of that fit into this new world of suburbia with all manner of parent school committees to join being thrust at her. I enjoyed how Craig showcased Barbara's difficulties with establishing a new life as a homemaker, with the running theme of their home not having furniture long after moving. The unsettled nature of the living space perfectly reflects the unsettled nature within Barbara as who she was is not lining up with who she could be or rather, who she is wondering she should be in this new environment.
Perhaps, most unsettled of all is Grandmother Sylvie who is not only confronted with life in New York City without family but also without any close friendships with people of her own age group. What does life now represent for her? The gradual realization that her best friend is an 11 year old girl gives the film a deep existential ache, I was thankful Kelly Fremon Craig did not ignore or brush aside and as you would expect, Kathy Bates is equal to every moment given to her, as she elicits the outward humor and the sorrow underneath.
Kelly Fremon Craig's "Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret" is a rare, understated jewel of a film designed and delivered to a youthful audience yet never for one moment, treats young people as commodities undeserving of an entertaining and artful narrative that treats their lives seriously. To that end, Craig has created an earnest and honest slice of life film that houses no villains and refuses to tie up every narrative thread into a too pristine bow. We are gifted the presence of being with a collective of characters all trying to understand what life on Earth means, and that makes for a another cinematic rarity these days as this is a film of gracious humanity.
Just like the novels of Judy Blume.
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