How do you make an inspirational film without a single believable scene? Ask the producers of Bottoms, a film that, to my disappointment, is not about anatomy at all. First off, this is high school and all the people look like twentysomething because THEY ALL ARE. Geez, this is almost as bad as “PEN15” or Grease.
Welcome to Rockbridge Falls High School, which has all the trappings of a normal American high school, but … not. Lemme ‘splain. For example, the football team RULEZ! Sure. That’s gonna happen. Are they going to wear their uniforms on campus 24/7? Guessing no, but hey, comedy. Are they going to have numbers like “01” and “02” instead of “1” and “2?” Well, no. That doesn’t happen, either. Again, comedy.
Our films is about the friendship of two lesbians, PJ (writer/star Rachel Sennott) and her bff Josie (Ayo Edebiri). They represent the depths or Bottoms of high school popularity. They, well, mostly PJ, are determined to hand in their virginity cards this year. We, of course, have seen many versions of this premise with horny nerd boys as our leads. Is there a difference when our leads our lesbians? Bottoms says, “HELL YES!”
At a pep rally disguised as a school fair, Josie, “rescues” her would-be squeeze Isabel (Havana Rose Liu, who looks about as appropriately high school as I do) from BMOC Jeff (Nicholas Galitzine). In the fall-out, Josie “injures” Jeff, who fakes like a veteran soccer star and Josie gets a red card from the principal. I like that the school gave no preferential treatment to our heroes, however, you’re gonna EXPEL them for an incident described entirely and only by the bigoted football guy? Sure, LGBTQ isn’t a protected class in all of America, but due process is … I think.
And then the girls get out of it by claiming on the spot that they are starting a self-defense class, which isn’t a bad idea, especially on a campus which leans FOOTBALL! Of course, instead of starting a self-defense class, PJ and Josie (again, mostly PJ) start a fight club, wooing participants on promise of friendship and solidarity when the idea is simply to score. Thanks, LGBeavisTQ.
Yeah, this is equally as bad as any Revenge of the Nerds plot point. And the film does itself no favors when PJ turns out to be an awful person. And there are no two ways around this. I don’t care if she is ugly or a lesbian, 
none of that matters; what matters is that PJ is a selfish, conniving, and unsupportive “friend.” This all made Bottoms, which had some very funny moments, difficult to watch.
Bottoms is a window dressing film in that the snippets are hilarious and quotable and make for a great trailer, but the rest of the film is strangely vacuous – or certainly more vacuous than it should be. And, I can’t emphasize enough, none of the scenes ring true, so they have to be interpreted as satire, which does absolutely nothing to help the LGBTQ community. I mean, yeah, it’s great to see the BMOC’s car blow up; that’s serious comeuppance for his being a douche. But you cannot tell me that someone who wields a bomb in high school doesn’t see consequences. This is hardly the only instance of such unrealistic exaggeration in Bottoms.
At the end of the day, I appreciated the satire for the sake of satire, but wish the film did more than echo teensploitation in odd satire form. Bottoms is a little like Heathers if the Heathers were gay and not terribly charismatic and no one cared about the deaths at the school. The character I ended up liking most was -of all people- uninspired teacher Mr. G (Marshawn Lynch, yes, THAT Marshawn Lynch, aka “Beast Mode,” who I believe might just have a decent career as an actor based on this performance). This is a film I wanted to love; I didn’t come close, but the peaks were enough to give it a pass.
Is it a high school comic upgrade?
LGBTQ now gets to persuade
Lesbians got game
But the plot’s just the same
These two just want to get laid
Rated R, 91 Minutes
Director: Emma Seligman
Writer: Emma Seligman, Rachel Sennott
Genre: The evolution of teen sexploitation
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: LGBTQ
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: Meathead jocks
