Cinematic Releases: Eighth Grade (2018) Reviewed

Being thirteen sucked. So did middle school. Anyone who says it didn’t was either really lucky or a damn liar. No matter how many times folks get nostalgic for the good old care free dog days of youth, no one in their right mind would ever want to go back to eighth grade. You are in a weird transitional period in eighth grade. You are too young to be in high school and you are too old to be hanging around eleven year olds. Everything feels earth shattering and life changing, whether it’s a school dance, locking eyes with a crush, or that Spanish assignment you forgot to do.  It’s a time of constant dread and suffocating anxiety. No film has captured that feeling more profoundly and honestly than Eighth Grade

Eighth Grade is the story of Kayla Day (Elsie Fisher). Kayla is your typical quiet teenage girl who is afraid to put herself out there. She, like most middle schoolers, is just trying to live day-to-day and hope that the changing world doesn’t trample them. Kayla has to endure the indignities and frustrations of suburban adolescence as she makes her way through the last week of middle school and starts hurdling towards high school. Along this week, we learn about who Kayla is as a person and our reminded of just how lonely and demoralizing this period of your life can be. 

Written and directed by first time director Bo Burnham, Eighth Grade is a profound film in many ways. It is very authentic and accurate. There are a lot of little things in this movie that ring true to both my generation and this current one. This maybe the first coming of age movie that really understand the post social media world we live in right now. Every nook and cranny of this feels real and true to the world our teens live in. The way the laptop cameras take their time before recording a video, even going as far as getting the actual sound and picture quality of a YouTube vlog. Every stylistic decision helps make the world of this movie feel more real and lived in.  There is a naturalism and honesty that is coursing through this film’s veins. Burnham’s use of color and frame composition shows a lot of talent, especially for a directorial debut.

The biggest strength of the film are the eighth grader’s themselves. The teenagers in this movie actually sound like teenagers and not what a screenwriter thinks teens sound like. They are awkward and not always smooth. They stumble over their own words. The words in this film feel real and true. Elsie Fisher and the young cast of this film do an excellent job of bringing these characters to life. Watching the journey Fisher’s character go through was deeply moving and I hope that directors and writers in Hollywood take notice of this film and get her in more movies as soon as possible. 

This is a film made for and by someone who has dealt with the same issues that Kayla and many teenagers, including myself, have gone through. That anxiousness and shyness is a thing that drags a lot of teenagers down. There were moments in this film where I almost cried because I had been in the same type of social situation that Kayla was going through and that is something that rarely happens to me. 

I like how Kayla is never the butt of the joke but rather a real human character who is dealing with some real human things. Burnham could have gone for the easy “Aren’t teenagers weird and different with their phones?” material that hacks and lesser filmmakers have done in the past. Instead, he empathizes and understands what Kayla is going through. It is a profound film in how cringe worthy and uncomfortable it gets while still being charming and delightful. As I was watching this film, I felt like I was watching a new strong directorial voice unfolding right in front of me. Bo Burnham is someone that I’ll be looking out for in the future and I hope that you do too.

Liam S. O'Connor