By: Ashleigh Lowe, W*SS Programs and Events Intern and WILD Co-Chair
!Spoilers Ahead!
How can two unattractive and untalented lesbians lose their virginity? By starting a fight club, duh. I recently saw ‘Bottoms’ after hearing this premise. I especially wanted to see it after finding out it was a queer film.
‘Bottoms,’ a movie written and directed by Emma Seligman, follows two “untalented gays”, Josie (Ayo Edebiri) and PJ (Rachel Sennott) in their senior year of high school. After trying unsuccessfully for years, PJ and Josie decide that this is the year that they are losing their virginity. However, this may be difficult since their cheerleader crushes are at the opposite end of the high school social ladder. After a major miscommunication leads the entire school to believe that the two spent the summer in juvie and maybe even killed a woman, hilarity ensues when they decide to start a girls Fight Club to help their classmates defend themselves and get what they want as well.
Since Josie and PJ started the Fight Club to sleep with their crushes, their motivation was ungenuine. Despite this, the other girls were able to gain a sense of solidarity and empowerment by being a member of the Fight Club. The club provided a safe space for the members where they could be themselves regardless of who they were outside the room. Hazel (Ruby Cruz) stated that the club gave her friends who saw her and liked her for who she was. In this satirical comedy, the relationships formed in Fight Club represent one of the more serious elements of the film.
However, we can’t forget about the humor. ‘Bottoms’ is full of raunchy humor and secondhand embarrassment that would make even the most confident of us cringe. One of the most embarrassing scenes comes early into the film when PJ and Josie are trying to flirt with their crushes Brittany (Kaia Jordan Gerber) and Isabel (Havana Rose Liu). The two of them said all the wrong things and I just wanted to scream at the screen, “Stop Talking!”. I realized though, that much of the seamless humor in this film comes from the comedic chemistry between the main characters played by Edibiri and Sennott.
‘Bottoms’ as a film doesn’t take itself too seriously and often makes fun of itself. In terms of lesbian films, this is extremely rare to see. Most of the lesbian films I have seen (e.g. ‘The Handmaiden’ or ‘A Picture of A Lady on Fire’) are heart-wrenchingly tragic and are emotionally exhausting for the viewer. ‘Bottoms’ is the complete opposite of this and could be seen as a break for the viewer. The film’s storyline and humor allowed me to relax and enjoy the film without becoming too stressed out by it. Another queer film that I saw this summer that doesn’t take itself too seriously is ‘Booksmart’ which also follows two losers trying to make up for lost time. Hopefully, filmmakers begin to see that viewers want more fun lighthearted queer movies. As a queer person, I want to see other queer people being unserious and making bad decisions because it is exhausting to watch queer trauma in every film.
And so I found ‘Bottoms’ to be an extremely fun watch. You will be laughing throughout the entire duration of the film. I thoroughly enjoyed it and highly recommend you see it if you haven’t yet!